Strong sales pushed Orange into the top 20 list of areas across NSW who received the most first home buyer benefits in December.

It was the only region outside of Sydney, the Central Coast, Newcastle and Wollongong/Illawarra to make the top 20.

Seven first home buyers in Orange each received the state government’s $10,000 first home owner grant for new homes.

And 36 buyers of new and existing homes benefited from stamp duty savings of an average $12,793 each.

In total $460,548 was handed out to help Orange buyers secure their first homes in December.

Just seven Sydney suburbs and Gosford had more first home buyers who obtained the stamp duty concession.

Campbelltown topped the list with 17 first home owner grants and 51 people receiving stamp duty concessions.

One couple to reap the benefits were Wayne Collett and Emma Georgiou who have just moved into their first home in Orange.

The stamp duty cut, as well as some other governments benefits Mr Collett was eligible for, helped them buy an existing house. 

“It made a huge change,” Mr Collett said.

“You are renting at the same time as trying to save to buy a house.

“It made it that little bit easier to buy our house.

“It gives you that little bit of cash to help out.”

The couple has been in the market for a while.

“We’ve been looking for the last 12 months but it was in the last six months that we decided to try and really get into it,” he said.

Mr Collett said it was a relief to be able to stop paying rent after many years.

“We’ve been paying rent for the last six years,” he said.

“I worked out I had paid about $60,000.”

They bought their home through the Century 21 Combined Orange real estate agency.

The licensee Andrew Vogler said first home buyers had been strong in the Orange market.

“It certainly has been progressively busy since it [the grants] came in on the first of July,” he said.

Mr Vogler said the purchases had been spread around Orange now that established homes were included in the benefits package.

“It really does depend on their budget,” he said.

Mr Vogler said most first home buyers were looking at houses at the affordable end of the market.

“It’s $200,000 upwards into the $400,000s,” he said.

Mr Vogler said demand had not eased off after Christmas.

“January is certainly busy,” he said.

“People are still actively looking and we’ve had more houses coming on the market.”

Under the state government scheme there are several areas of benefit for first home buyers.

It provides a $10,000 grant for people buying houses up to $600,000 and a similar grant for builders of new homes up to $750,000.

Stamp duty has been abolished on all homes [new and existing] up to $650,000.

And stamp duty relief is available for homes up to $800,000.

It has also abolished insurance duty on lenders’ mortgage insurance.

In December  571 grants totalling $6.6 million were handed out in NSW.

And 2821 people gained the stamp duty exemptions and concessions which totalled about $40.3 million.