North Rocks house from Selling Houses Australia Extreme.
Address: North Rocks, NSW
List Price: $720,000 -750,000
Sale price: $740,000
Makeover budget: $30,000
Story Synopsis:
A 30-metre power pylon in the front yard is enough to turn the stomachs of most buyers, but not George and Lynda Antonjevec. When they spied their enormous five bedroom property in North Rocks, it was love at first sight. The architect designed house and rambling three quater acre block was perfect for their growing family.
But fast-forward 13 years and it’s a different story. The maintenance on the house and gardens is killing them, not to mention draining their bank account. Desperate for a simpler life, they purchased a town house off the plan and put their North Rocks home on the market. That was 18 months ago, and with little hope of a sale and a second mortgage about to kick in, they’re getting desperate.
The Interior:
This enormous house was stuck in the 80s. It felt dark and cold inside thanks to an abundance of bricks and hard surfaces. George and Lynda had tried to warm things up by painting the walls a salmon pink, but it only added to the house’s dated look. Shaynna’s first job was to neutralise the rainbow of colours and give the house one uniform paint colour. She chose a warm neutral from Taubmans Endure Interior called “Torte”. This colour was used in the hallway, entrance, lounge, kitchen and master bedroom. The trims were painted in Taubmans Endure Interior semi gloss ‘Warm Smoke”.
The kitchen had already been updated, but the mixture of orange floor tiles, orange stone bench and orange wall tiles was overwhelming to say the least. Shaynna decided to modernise the room by laying a floating wood floor from Carpet Call in a red shade to match the existing tiles. Then she covered one brick wall with gyprock and painted with Taubmans Endure Interior low sheen “Torte”. The finishing touch was to spray the existing orange wall tiles white with a hard wearing polyurethane paint from Resurfacing Australia.
The lounge room was the feature of the house but the enormous blue vertical blinds and the dark blue carpet gave it a look straight out of the 80s. The budget just wouldn’t stretch to new carpet, so instead Shaynna focussed on the window dressings, as they were such a focal point in the room. She chose a made-to-measure light filtering roller blind from Blindsonline.com.au. The room was dressed with a mixture of modern and retro furniture from Valiant Hire. And the awful blue carpet was hidden under a series of rugs, also from Valiant Hire.
Probably the biggest job of the interior fit out was transforming the awful purple, gold and avocado en-suite. We didn’t have the budget for a totally new bathroom, so it was a matter of neutralising the colours and putting in new bathware and fittings. The first job was to lay a new floor using simple white tiles by Beaumont Tiles. Then, the wall tiles were sprayed white by Resurfacing Australia with the same polyurethane paint that was used in the kitchen. The avocado bath was also sprayed white and new a new toilet, basin and taps were added which were supplied by Caroma Dorf. The effect was a new, white modern bathroom for a fraction of the price of a new bathroom fit out.
Garden:
George and Lynda’s home was set in almost three quarters of an acre of gardens, so it was hard to know where to start. Charlie decided to focus his budget and energies on the area directly surrounding the house, the pool, the lower driveway and entrance.
The first job was to sort out the way people entered the house. When the team arrived, the front door was actually around the back and was difficult to find. Charlie decided to address this by building a timber bridge from the driveway to the existing balcony and using the door into the living area from the balcony as the new front door.
First he had to remove a section of brick wall, using a brick saw hired from Kennards Hire. Then he constructed the engineered bridge out of treated pine timber supplied by Midcoast Timber Centres. The bridge design had a Japanese influence to match the adjacent maple tree and the finished product was stained to look like hardwood.
To spruce up the rest of the house Charlie painted the garage door and facia in Taubmans Endure exterior low sheen “Manhattan”. He finished off the area with two pots from Potsonline planted with a Philodendron “Xanadu”.
The other big area Charlie focussed on was the pool. He weeded the beds and planted them up with a sub tropical mix of plants including Cardamon and Bamboo supplied by Alpine Nurseries. The beds in the terraced stone retaining wall were planted out with agave, as they are drought tolerant and can withstand harsh sunny positions.
Next to the driveway, Charlie weeded and mulched the beds with pine bark mulch supplied by Materials in the Raw. He couldn’t afford a new fence, so instead reset the existing metal fence and painted in Taubmans Endure Exterior low sheen “Black Fox”. The wooden handrail to the steps leading down the pool was given a neutral fresh coat of paint in Taubmans Endure Exterior “Athena”.
Taubmans Endure Colour Chart:
Hallway - Walls in Torte - Low Sheen and Trim in Warm Smoke – Semi Gloss
Kitchen - As above
Lounge- As above
Master bedroom- As above
Garage door and facia - Manhattan – Low Sheen
Railings - Black Fox – Exterior Gloss
Products
Bathroom makeover:
Caroma Dorf supplied the following products for our bathroom makeover:
Master Ensuite:
• Leda Vasque Above Counter Vanity Basin with Track Sink Mixer
• Lusso lever bath set
• Metro Close Coupled toilet
• Liano Rail Shower with Lusso lever wall top assemblies.
• Lusso lever basin tap set
• Double towel rail – Liano range
• Wall Mirror
Main bathroom:
• Toilet roll holder – Liano range
• Vanity tap set – Liano range
Blinds:
Single (blockout only) roller blinds in “Yoko – Cobble” for the bedrooms, and double (light filtering and blockout) roller blinds in the lounge were used from Blinds Online. The blockout is in “Metro – Straw” and the light filtering blind is in “Riviere – Monte Carlo”.
Plants:
4x Asplenium ‘victoria’ 250mm
7x Raphis excelsa 300mm
9x Westringis fruiticosa shaped in balls 300mm
7x Cordyline fruiticosa “manners sutbnae” 250mm
5x Agave attentauta 250mm
1x Bambusa glaucescens “Alphonse Karr” 45 lt
7x Alpinia nutans (Dwarf Cardamom) 200M
9x Hedychium coronarium 200mm
5x Carex paludosa 200mm
5x Philodendron “Xanadu” 300mm
HI, I am just wondering where the lovely Reading Chair comes from? I love it and really want one.
It was on Fox last week Nikki, Life Style channel.
Where can I watch this episode? I want to watch it. I know who bought the house.
Hi, I am a local Real Estate Agent in the Hills Rural Area. I was watching your show last night about this property at North Rocks and the power easement on this property. I was wondering if i was able to get the report regarding the Power Easements off you as i found this very interesting, and will be wonderful to hand out to perspective buyers in my area.
I think that the team has made an amazing difference once again. Well done I just love the show