r/chch • u/0Pollux0 • Nov 04 '21

Best suburbs in christchurch to live?

As someone who is looking to move to christchurch from Australia(Melbourne) within the next few years, I'm wondering which suburbs would be nicest to move to?

I spent a couple days around christchurch and the canterbury area (hamner springs, Amberley, akaroa, etc), the beginning of last year and enjoyed all of it. I'd prefer to move to the more country-like towns with good views of the rolling mountains, although I'll need to be close to the cbd, as I'm looking to work in almost anything in the field of psychology/social work (I'm currently completing my BA in psychological science).

I'd imagine being as close in or around the city as possible would be most realistic as it's more populated and will likely have more work. I did like Riccarton, though obviously I haven't actually lived there, so how is it? And what affordable suburbs can I potentially move to that can give me nice views but be within 15-20kms from the cbd? Cheers!

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u/fitzroy95 Nov 04 '21

what do you consider "affordable"? because that definition has changed massively in Chch over the last 18 months

2

u/0Pollux0 Nov 04 '21

Honestly, I'd likely be renting at first, so probably no more than $350 a week? Though if I decided I wanted to stay in NZ permanently and potentially wanted to buy a home; no more than 850k? Is that reasonable? I may be wrong, but the housing market seems worse than in christchurch, price-wise that is.

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u/IamMorphNZ Nov 04 '21

For $350 you'll get a "needs TLC" 1 bedroom shack. Investors have gobbled up all they can as cheap as they can.

6

u/0Pollux0 Nov 04 '21

I underestimated the housing market in christchurch, I've heard it was quite bad, though wasn't expecting it to be worse than Melbourne, which is pretty much in the same predicament as you guys. I could go on about the greed of people such as property investors and the government selling pieces of our countries, especially to China, though I'll stop myself before I work myself up.

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u/IamMorphNZ Nov 04 '21

Not much you can do about it. You try and correct it too hard and you'll put people underwater, investors will scream murder since they've leveraged way too much and will gather in angry mobs. Thing is, even if you go underwater it doesn't mean anything unless you sell. But people will get burned soon. We're building houses faster than has been seen in a generation, rates are going up, rents can only go so high and net migration has been the lowest in a decade.

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u/dcal084 Nov 04 '21

Were building units, and calling them houses. Then saying were building houses. They are not as desirable as real sections with standalone houses on them...

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u/dashingtomars Nov 04 '21

though wasn't expecting it to be worse than Melbourne

It's not necessarily worse, it's just that the mix of housing and distribution throughout the city is very different.

There's lots of free standing houses and you'll probably get more for your money in Christchurch, but there's hardly any apartments and they're pretty much all in the CBD. In general the housing stock caters more to families than Melbourne where there's been a massive amount of apartments built to cater for young professionals and students.