Tim Pallas (left) with Baw Baw mayor Joe Gauci in Drouin earler this month.
Drouin’s proximity to Melbourne and house prices make it an ideal place for first home-owners, according to Victoria’s Treasurer.
Speaking earlier this month at the site of the future Drover’s Landing development, which will feature over 1,800 housing lots with provision for schools and other family facilities, Tim Pallas said towns like Drouin offered great opportunities for those looking for their first home.
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“Drouin, in many ways, is an embodiment of why you can get the best of both worlds when it comes to first home ownership in regional and rural Victoria,” Mr Pallas said.
“It’s really a demonstration of how our Homes for Victorians policy is actually working.”
Mr Pallas said increases in the value of Victoria’s first home-owners grants and changes to stamp duty have boosted developer confidence in the region.
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“What we’re seeing is a big take-up on the state’s first home owner grants,” he said.
“We doubled the grants about six months ago from $10,000 to $20,000, and what we found as a consequence of that was a more than doubling of the take-up from first homeowners, from 394 take-ups in the six months preceding that, to in the last six months over 1,000 first home owner grants.
“It has helped make the business case for the developers here.
“The other great advantage is the comparative price of housing in rural and regional Victoria, and of course here in Drouin.”
A version of this story first appeared in the 25 February Baw Baw In Brief, which you can watch in full here:
Click here for links mentioned in this video
This would be much truer if the government committed to a third rail line for Vline exclusive use through the metro area. Support the infrastructure in parallel with development!
Hold the phone, the article states that “Drouin’s proximity to Melbourne and house prices make it an ideal place for first home-owners”. Wait, what, huh, seriously? Having lived previously in Berwick [around 42 km’s from the city] and being told at the time that it was too far for regular travel to/from the city, these clowns (err, I mean, experts) are now promoting Drouin [around 93 km’s from the city] as being within {close} proximity to the city. Both the local-maintained and Vicroads-maintained roads are absolutely appalling and literally shake local residents’ vehicles to pieces (which must generate great business for the local mechanics) and the absolutely woeful public transport is a joke at the best of [peak and off-peak] times. And just check out the new mini-ghettos that these so-called developers are dotting in and around Drouin, Warragul, Longwarry, Bunyip, Garfield, etc, that look just like the ones in and around good ol’ Pakenham-in (pun intended). What used to be rolling green pastures of good farmland is now just full of these tiny, tiny house blocks with McMansions built on them (the gutters on some of the roofs on these homes almost touch directly above the fence line), housing all of these ‘new’ locals, who drive like they’re still living in the city and have the cheek to honestly believe that they’re now to be called country folk, as they’re no longer townies. Someone, please tell ’em they’re dreamin!!!
P.S. I love the photo in the above article of the bloke picking (err, I mean, scratching) his nose, nice one!!!
John, love your comment about Pakenham-in. I can just imagine Drouin in 10 years time when it will be quicker to walk than ride the car through town. It is not far away from that now. The other week I drove east out of town and there were about 70 cars queuing up to get through town.
I guess the Shire is rubbing its hands with glee about all the rates it is going to collect. That is if you ever pass GO.
It is obvious the Minister isn’t familiar with the pathetic rail service from Warragul / Drouin into the CBD. With an average time of 1 hour 40 minutes to travel 100 km from Warragul to Melbourne by train you would have rocks in your head to settle in the Warragul / Drouin area.
Paul Strickland’s Comment hits the mark. Investment in an exclusive V line third rail line through Metro Melbourne must be part of the plans. Regarding the planning. I would like to see a green buffer between the two towns to avoid Drouin and Warragul becoming an urban sprawl. Lets plan to maintain some sense of living outside of Melbourne please.
Is it April Fools already? The developers and their ridiculous restrictive covenants, along with the shire, must be rubbing their hands with glee as they line up at the trough to fleece the poor folk pushed further and further from Melbournes outskirts by the outrageous high prices of housing, both rental and purchase. I’m watching land in my what used to be quiet rural town being subdivided down to 200 square meters with houses that fit the lot and touch, eave to eave. They’re lucky if they have a handkerchief for a lawn. And the covenants don’t allow for :shock! Horror!: smaller houses. If you ask one of the builders at Warraguls new housing ghetto, oh sorry, estate, they look down their noses and laugh and then blame it on the developers. Not everyone wants a four bedroom open plan concrete box and yet these delightful environmental nightmares will set you back between $380-800K. Affordable, my a$$.
And where is the infrastructure to support these mass ghettos? There is none. Another joke.
This makes me so angry. Drouin cannot cope at the moment with the vehicles in the main street, come school time it’s a major headache to go there.
Is this the land at McGlones Road? If so, it would be obvious why the concerned residents of Fairway Drive were not given a proper hearing as to their concerns about the Golf Club Development.
Rural and regional living? Lot of catching up to do. The services taken for granted when living in the Melbourne metropolitan area just aren’t there!
I like where I live:
BUT
No public transport (not that I really expect it)
We had to lobby literally for decades to get a sealed road
We had a good hospital in Warragul. The powers-that -be in the State Government must have a clause in the regulations governing those people moving from Melbourne (that I don’t know about) because unless they all have perfect health the hospital will burst its’ seams. And the money to update our hospital just doesn’t appear to be on the radar.
There has been a local bushfire. After one day’s excited reporting ABC Melbourne dropped it off the list. Not even the occasional reminder that info is available on ABC Gippsland ( which we don’t pick up satisfactorily).
Internet: poor access
Phone: fixed line out of order & waiting to be fixed. Mobile has recently gone from dodgy to disastrous (we are with Optus and a Telstra tower has gone up close to us)
Safety/fire news: if we didn’t belong to the CFA and have contacts we would be blissfully ignorant that it still existed)
So please before we go any further down the population line can the government decide whether we are peri urban or remote rural and at least let us know!