Three prominent Australians share the experience of purchasing their first property

They’re known professionally across the country, but the personal experience of buying a home was much the same for these three media personalities as it was for any another Australian.

Adam Liaw / Chef and author

Liaw first entered the property market in his home town of Adelaide as a recent law graduate. The year was 1999 and he had saved enough to purchase a three-bedroom, inner-city terrace after years working in hospitality while studying.

The property layout was unusual, requiring residents to walk outside to access the upper level. Renovations were necessary before moving in just to bring it up to a liveable state.

“In the cellar there was literally ankle-deep water, so I had to put in some drainage and pumps and re-concrete it,” Liaw says. “It was a bit of a death trap when we moved in there, to be honest.”

Liaw lived in the house with friends who rented off him while he paid the mortgage.

He jokes: “Rather than blowing all my cash on fun things, I thought I should debilitate myself with a mortgage.

“The romance of having a mortgage wasn’t the most fun thing in the world for a 21-year-old guy. I wasn’t making a lot of money at that point, I was on a first year lawyer’s salary, so a fair chunk of that was going into paying a mortgage.”

Liaw sold the property after two years for about $215,000 – an approximate $80,000 return – although part of him wishes he still held onto it today. It last sold in 2017 for $828,000.

“I think your first house is a lot more about numbers than it is about emotion,” Liaw says. “I had someone else go to the auction for me so that there wasn’t going to be an emotional kind of panic bid to buy it, so I got the house for the price I wanted.”

Shaynna Blaze / Interior and homewares designer

While she’s best known for her house flipping and styling advice on The Block and Selling Houses Australia, Shaynna Blaze’s own property history is surprisingly limited, having lived in the first home that she bought in 1987 for almost 15 years.

The property was a suburban cottage shrouded in rhododendrons and azaleas with a 1970s interior renovation involving tacky wallpaper, dated carpet and mirrored wall tiles. While it wasn’t perfect, Blaze saw its potential to feature three bedrooms despite being advertised as only a two-bedroom home.

“Trying to find [the right] price point was our big motivator. Something with three bedrooms, a bit of land, and what we could afford, and that was literally the only place,” she says.

Blaze went on to renovate the home in stages, adding practical details when financially possible such as wardrobes, a laundry and updating the kitchen.

“I put on a very big deck on the back part of it. We sat out there every night and watched the sunset, it was so divine,” she says.

“My kids have got the best memories there. They’re now in the market to buy, and every house they look at that, they compare it and wonder if it could be a beautiful place like that one.”

Matt Wilson / Neighbours actor and Mazda ambassador

The experience of buying a home is far more recent for Wilson, having just signed the papers for a Mornington Peninsula property in early March 2019.

While initially hesitant to purchase property so far from work in Melbourne, Wilson was tiring of city living with its limited parking and tight block sizes and was persuaded to move by veteran Neighbours star and Mornington Peninsula resident Ryan Moloney (who plays Toadfish Rebecchi).

“It’s absolutely perfect for myself and my wife. We love the location and everything that’s around it. It’s about an hour and a bit out of town, so we’re swapping the convenience of living near work for the lifestyle of this,” Wilson says.

“When we were looking online, nothing else came close to how good this place was. Nothing.”

Wilson and his wife Jessica had been carefully budgeting in the lead-up to buying while keeping a close eye on the changing market. They were eventually able to purchase their property for $5000 under the asking price.

“I had to make a lifestyle change to nestle down and start saving. My now-wife, who works in finance, assigned me a budget and allocated nearly every single dollar. Once you’ve got that in place, and you’ve got some rules and some boundaries, it’s pretty easy to save then,” he says.

His advice to other budding home owners is to thoroughly research areas you’re interested in and how they change throughout the year. He also recommends having a friend negotiate a sale on your behalf to avoid becoming too emotionally invested.