‘A bit of a secret’: Sydney suburbs where home owners stay the longest

When Mary and Ted Cullen bought their home in the leafy Sydney suburb of North Epping, they wanted to put down roots and create an idyllic base for their growing family, reminiscent of their own childhoods.

Over more than 50 years of ownership, they achieved their dream. Seven children cycled through the house, as did some of the next generation of grandchildren.

Peter Cullen’s parents, Mary and Ted, owned their North Epping home for more than 50 years.Credit: Louise Kennerley

“It was very much the launch pad for all of us,” said IT architect son Peter Cullen, 48, who now lives just one suburb over from his childhood home.

The Cullen family are not alone. North Epping is one of Sydney’s most beloved suburbs, new research has revealed, with home sellers having held their property for a median of 19 years.

The weatherboard cottage on a large block spans six bedrooms after a number of renovations, and was “very much a base of operations” for the family, said Cullen, the site of barbecues and explorations into the national park it backs onto.

“It was a place we brought friends back to, and it was down a battleaxe block, so there was always very much a sensation of coming home into our little oasis,” he said of his childhood.

Mary, a teacher, and Ted, a doctor, have now passed, but they never genuinely entertained leaving the suburb. After 53 years, the house is now on the market.

“They were very, very much proud of the house and proud of the history, but, more, they loved the peace and quiet, and the neighbourhood and the community that they were a part of,” Cullen said.

North Epping was bettered by four other suburbs in Cotality’s data on median hold periods for houses sold in the 12 months to April. Home sellers held properties in Bonnyrigg Heights, in the Fairfield region, for 22.1 years, followed by southern suburbs Ramsgate Beach and Yarrawarrah, both at 20.7 years and Hassall Grove, in the Mount Druitt region, at 20.4 years.

Sydney, overall, has a median hold period of 9.4 years.

Cotality’s head of research, Eliza Owen, said suburbs with long-tenured residents frequently had a low proportion of rented properties and were “family oriented” suburban areas.

“It’s often areas that have good schools,” she said. “Families settle in and they stay there.

“So, if you look at a suburb like North Epping, for example, a lot of what were young families 10 or 20 years ago are now ageing in place or empty nesting in place,” she said.

According to 2021 census data, 47 per cent of homes in North Epping were owned outright, compared to 31.5 per cent statewide. Just 11.5 per cent of homes in the suburb were rented.

The Cullen family home’s agent, Kevin Dearlove, director of Stone Real Estate, Beecroft and Epping, thought North Epping had been “undervalued and a bit of a secret”.

“It’s a great place to raise your children, and it’s a very green suburb. It’s dog parks, it’s public playgrounds, it’s bushwalking through Lane Cove National Park,” he said.

“You can drive towards the city very, very comfortably. And it’s also got fantastic schooling.”

Dearlove said some North Epping residents upgraded locally.

Some areas in western Sydney areas are now seeing strong home price growth.Credit: Peter Rae

“Like most of Sydney, it’s gone up in value over the years. So people have just held on to their homes with no reason to move.”

Areas that rose in value recently often make the long-held suburbs list, said Owen, such as the longest-tenured suburb by home sellers, Bonnyrigg Heights, up over 11 per cent in the past 12 months, compared to an annual rise across Sydney of 1.3 per cent.

“A lot of those western Sydney areas where people have bought in decades ago are now seeing particularly strong growth because affordability constraints are skewing a lot of buyers to those areas,” she said.

Mark McCrindle, a demographer from McCrindle, said rising home values lead to “some stability,” with people investing in their homes and renovating for different life stages.

“These areas have become gentrified or more desirable in their very tenure of hold, and so while it was affordable when they moved in, it becomes an even better area as they pay down the mortgage,” he said.

McCrindle said long-held properties tend to have been bought by couples starting families, and “then they want to raise the children in those homes”.

Matteo Pecora, sales executive from Ray White Wetherill Park and Cecil Hills, said many people stay in Bonnyrigg Heights for its community and proximity to main roads.

“It’s a quiet suburb, so I think it ticks a lot of boxes for young families,” he said.

The Bonnyrigg Heights market was “a low transacting area,” Pecora said, adding that there was “an abundance of buyers that want to live in the suburb” – when properties come on the market.