For one young couple, the road to property ownership has required a lot of hard slog, a bit of financial worry and a dose of good luck.
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Matty Georgiou, a product of Bowen and Glenroi primary schools and Canobolas Rural Technology High School, was 24 when he and then girlfriend and Hockeyroo Jade Warrender - who also went to Glenroi and CRTHS - bought their first house five years ago.
"We moved around and lived in Perth for a few years, and were always renting," Mr Georgiou said. "We wanted to buy our own house and when we moved back from Perth we started looking."
Mr Georgiou said mortgage broker Jason Puxty "took us under his wing" and helped inform them on buying and investing.
The three-bed, two-bath Burrendong Way house, on about 700 square metres, cost $292,000.
"My parents went guarantor - we wouldn't have been able to do it without that," said Mr Georgiou, who works at CRTHS's Clontarf Foundation. "It's so tricky for young people wanting to buy, because you've got to save such a big deposit; 15 to 20 percent is near-impossible."
Fans of TV renovating shows The Block and House Rules, Mr and Mrs Georgiou - a teacher at Kinross Wolaroi School - embraced home renovations.
"I got Ash Brown [from One Agency] to do a valuation and he put the property at $480,000 to $500,000, but I'm a qualified carpenter, and I did a lot of work to that house and probably spent $50-60,000, plus a lot of time in school holidays and on weekends."
In February the couple bought their second property, a four-bedder on about 1200 square metres, in East Orange. They live there, with the first home rented out.
"I've already extended the laundry and the mud room, put in ducted heating and cooling, lights, and painted externally," said Mr Georgiou.
And in what is possibly the understatement of the year, he added: "I think it's getting to be a bit of a hobby."
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