Meahan Callaghan hated her house. Her renovated terrace in Melbourne's Middle Park was small and uncomfortable.
"I did think of moving, originally," Ms Callaghan, an HR consultant, said. "I was cramped, I had a small baby, was on my own and I hated the place. I felt like I lived in a cupboard."
But finding nothing she wanted in the neighbourhood she loved, Callaghan opted to renovate. For about $5500 per square metre, she demolished the back half of her weatherboard worker's cottage and built a two-storey addition that filters out the harsh direct sunlight with a perforated steel mesh.
The house, designed by Austin Maynard Architects, took out an award for residential alterations in Thursday's national architectural awards, adding to a win in the Victorian state-level awards earlier in the year.
Rising property prices in Sydney and Melbourne and the prospect of not being able to find or afford something suitable is prompting many owners to consider renovating and extending their existing dwellings, rather than moving.
Transaction costs are another hurdle.
"I was going to have to pay a whole lot of money in stamp duty to move three streets away," she said.
The country's top-awarded renovation was a $300,000 alteration to a heritage-registered red brick cottage in Hobart's Battery Point. The Rosevear Stephenson-designed project which won, demolished a weatherboard laundry at the back of the house and built an open kitchen/dining/living room in a contemporary concrete, steel, glass and masonry extension.
The other national win for residential alterations this week was the conversion of a combined 280-square-metre rooftop of two adjoining apartment buildings in Sydney's Darlinghurst into a garden.
"It was originally just a flat asphalt roof where they used to hang laundry, and there was a caretaker's cottage," said Will Fung, the director of architecture firm CO-AP. "We added a rooftop pavilion which contained a kitchen, living-dining and a series of external garden spaces."
Official figures show renovations are falling, unlike previous housing booms when they have risen along with rising construction numbers and rising prices. The value of residential alterations and additions fell for a sixth straight month in September after a pick-up. Possible reasons include the generational change from baby boomers, who invested heavily in their large family homes, to Generation X and Y who have less money and possibly less interest in renovating.
But in areas such as Melbourne's inner-south and Sydney's inner-west, owners are increasingly opting to renovate rather than move, aided by a relaxation in planning laws, local agents say.
Ms Callaghan agreed. "When I first lived in this area, once you had a couple of kids, you moved for schools and a backyard," she said. "South Melbourne is building two schools at the moment, which just shows you."
