Desperate Wellington house hunters ask for help in newspaper ad

There is little on the market that's in the Coles' price range, they say. Photo / File

A desperate Wellington family have taken the step of placing an ad in the local newspaper in a bid to buy a house.

Rochelle Cole and her partner have been looking for a home for their family of five since the beginning of the year, with a budget of $500,000, but have barely found anything in their price range.

"We just felt we were up against so many walls," Cole said on Wellington's Newstalk ZB breakfast show this morning.

"There's just so many people out there looking and everyone seems to have a little bit more money than we have and there just seems to be hardly anything on the market at the moment."

The family, who are renting in Brooklyn, thought if they were willing to buy out in Porirua or the Hutt, they would be able to get a bigger house with plenty of room for the kids to play.

But as they began the house hunt, those dreams came crashing down.

"I think reality can bring you back down to earth," she said.

Their requirements are that the house be warm and healthy, have three bedrooms, have a back yard for the kids to play in, and be within commuting distance to the Wellington CBD.

The maximum commute they are looking at is about 45 minutes. While they did look at buying in Featherston in Wairarapa, Cole said they would not be able to afford that commute on top of mortgage payments.

She didn't mind having to do DIY work if walls needed peeling and repainting and so on, but the house needed to be of a quality that it would still be easily resalable in several years' time.

They have only put in one tender so far, but Cole said the issue was more that there were few houses in a price range low enough to even put an offer in.

Cole's parents put an ad in the local paper today making a plea for help.

"Our kids have 1/2 million $$$ and would love to own their own home," the ad read.

"Pops & Grandma have done all they can $$."

Since being interviewed on Newstalk ZB this morning, callers have already been contacting the station to say they have houses that Cole could look at.

She said if anyone wanted to contact her they could look at doing a private sale - cutting out the hassle of real estate agent fees and open homes.

Cole can be contacted by email at coleshousehunt@gmail.com or by phone on 022 328 1082.