Glenbrook hot spot

By Alex May

The Glenbrook locals like to think their village is the riviera of the Blue Mountains.

This lower Blue Mountains village is just 10 minutes drive from Penrith and does not suffer the bleak, cold winters that Katoomba, Leura and Blackheath can endure.
“It’s always warmer here than in other parts of the mountains,” says longtime local Brad Leckie, who moved to Glenbrook as a child in the 1970s.

But the weather alone cannot explain the phenomenon of rising house prices in this tranquil village, which is just over an hour’s train ride from Central Station. Australian Property Monitors says the median house price in Glenbrook to June 2004 is $455,000, which is a whopping 189 per cent increase since June 1999 – it is also the highest median price of any Blue Mountains village.

Macquarie Bank’s head of property research Rod Cornish says Glenbrook has become one of Sydney’s affordable lifestyle destinations, where harried Sydneysiders retreat to when property prices get too much in the city.
“Families decide they are better moving to a place within an easy train trip of the city, but they can get some space and a feeling of a rural lifestyle,” he says.

Brad says Glenbrook is a truly unique village, with a single storey strip of shops and its own cinema opposite a family-friendly park with picnic tables.
“Some of the other towns up here are split by the highway so they don’t have the same village atmosphere,” he says.
Brad grew up running around the national park and swimming in places like the Blue Pool and Duck Hole in Glenbrook Creek.
“The national park and the bush are a big attraction. I like the open space,” he says.
Brad, his wife Lee and two children Ryan and Shannon, like the tranquillity of Glenbrook but its easy access to facilities at Penrith.
“Penrith is less than 10-minutes drive away and it has all the entertainment and sport that the kids need,” he says.
“But if we want to go out for dinner, we will head up the mountain and go into Katoomba where there are loads of restaurants to choose from.”

Jeff Adams Real Estate principal Jeff Adams says Glenbrook’s property boom has been fuelled by a mix of Sydneysiders and Blue Mountains locals bidding up prices.
“A lot of people from Blaxland or other villages are trying to get into Glenbrook because of the village atmosphere,” he says.
“Then we get a lot of families coming from the inner west in Sydney – once they have a child they decide they can’t bring them up in a townhouse and they need some space.”
There are around 700 houses in Glenbrook, and the future supply is limited by the lack of development opportunities in the Blue Mountains.
“This is a national park with World Heritage Listing which means there just isn’t the opportunity for more development,” Adams says.
“People now are paying $500,000 to $550,000 for a house they will knock down in Glenbrook.”

Jim Aitken + Partners Real Estate principal Jim Aitken says Glenbrook is the Leura of the lower mountains.
“There are plans afoot to upgrade the shops there and make it more of a tourist destination,” he says.

Australian Property Monitors research director Louis Christopher says Glenbrook’s rise in house prices has to come to an end soon.
“We will never get the situation of place in the Blue Mountains being more expensive than the coast or the city because relativity always has to exist in the property market,” he says.
“We are expecting the slowdown or fall we have seen in the inner city areas will transpire in the outer areas like Glenbrook eventually.”

Median* house price to June 2004 $455,000
Median* house price to June 2003 $387,000
Growth* in median house price since 1999 189 per cent
APM 12 month house price growth projection* 0 to 4 per cent

Where is it: 54km west of the CBD, on the train line after Lapstone and before Blaxland.
Did you know: There is a fire trail between Woodford and Glenbrook which offers some great mountain biking.

* all figures from Australian Property Monitors, publishers of the Home Price Guide