Pote

My wife, two children and I have been living in Balga for four years. We bought a brand new 3x2 for $350k with wooden floors, raised ceilings and granite benchtops throughout (wouldn't get it for that price now). We have never had a problem in Balga. We used to live in Wembley near the pub and constantly got woken up by drunk people during the night. In Balga, our neighbours are all so friendly, my children have so many great friends they meet at the local park from lots of different countries which I believe puts them ahead in later life as we are becoming more and more global.

Location, location, location. What can I say 15 minutes east and we are in Swan Valley for the afternoon enjoying bee-sting cake. 15 minutes south and we are in the CBD enjoying a meal at a restaurant. 15 minutes west and we are at the beach. Then north we have Hillarys. It's five minutes to Warwick shopping centre, 5 minutes to Mirrabooka shopping centre and 10 minutes to Galleria and Coventry Square now with the 24 hour spud shed. We are also only a matter of minutes to Malaga and Balcatta which have your bigger shops like officeworks and Harvey Norman.

Balga has changed a lot even in the four years I've lived here. My whole street has been knocked down and rebuilt in that time and it resembles something more like desperate housewives than when we first moved in. There are a couple of bad pockets especially around the central shopping/IGA area but I suspect this will get cleaned up in the future.

Oh I almost forgot. Don't get me started on the leisure centre just down the road. It's huge I go to the gym, my kids do swimming classes there every week. Some weekends we all go as a family - it's the best.