Out Of The Ordinary Homes: Australia's Weirdest Real Estate
This is the widest net we cast, and it catches the strangest fish. Out Of The Ordinary is our catch-all for the properties that don't fit anywhere else — castles built by hand over a decade, a Wild West town hidden behind an ordinary verandah house, statues of religious figures standing sentry in bedrooms, indoor rock pools, cheetah-skin stair runners, and every other architectural decision that made us stop scrolling and start filming. These are the listings where the real estate agent's dot points genuinely cannot capture what's going on, and where a description like “unique opportunity” turns out to be the understatement of the year. If you've ever wanted proof that Australian real estate is far weirder and more wonderful than the display-home estates suggest, start here.
For SaleFort Knox, But Damp
Made the list because somewhere in the design process, someone looked at a two-storey void running through the middle of a castle and thought 'yes, that's where the pool goes' and nobody in the room disagreed.
AuctionMoon Base Karalee
Made the list for being a cluster of concrete domes on a riverfront block that reads less like a floor plan and more like a lunar landing that decided to stay and start a cult.
For saleThe Long Way Home: Elevated Plains
Made the list for being a 110-metre certified Passivhaus that also runs as a working farm, a greenhouse and a cooking school for 120 people — a concept so ambitious the marketing copy needed the phrase 'architecture of enduring significance' just to keep a straight face.
SoldThe Toilet's Right There: Glebe
Made the list for winning the 2020 Wilkinson Award for Residential Architecture, a prize we can only assume is judged by people who have never needed the toilet at 2am next to someone else's boyfriend.
For SaleThe Chouse Of Greendale
Made the list for being an actual 1849 church, designed by the same architect as St Andrew's Cathedral, converted into a house without anyone bothering to tone down the vibe.
SoldAre These Homeowners Doomsday Preppers?
Made the list for a 12.8kW solar system running 32 panels, a 20kW battery bank, floodlights and security cameras bolted to every shed on the property, and not one but several fully self-contained outbuildings with their own plumbing, power, and living space.
Not for saleJesus Take The Wheel: Oran Park
Made the list for a spiral staircase so dramatic it needed a compass rose inlaid into the marble floor beneath it, a ceiling that appears to have been designed by someone who had just discovered what a computer could do, a life-size Jesus statue standing vigil in the master bedroom, and a crucifix mounted directly behind the dining table so that every family dinner is technically a Last Supper.
Not for saleThe Cannon-Ball Estate
Made the list for an indoor rock pool with a waterfall, under a glass rotunda dome, overlooked by a second-storey balcony strung entirely in coloured fairy lights, which is either the greatest thing we have ever seen in a private residence or the second greatest thing, depending on how you feel about wagon wheel furniture.
SoldSave Moonya: Burwood's Stained-Glass Time Capsule
Made the list for stained-glass doors that belong in a cathedral, a kitchen frozen somewhere between 1955 and the invention of wallpaper, and the fact that a developer wants to knock the whole thing down and build something beige.
For SaleGidget Goes to Palm Springs
Made the list for two bars (one with a keg, one with banana-leaf wallpaper), a yellow water slide off the upper deck, brolgas painted across every wall of the kitchen, and an open-plan ensuite arrangement that assumes a lot about your relationship.
For SaleValley Of The Dolls
Made the list for a doll collection so large it has its own floor-to-ceiling shelving system in not one but two rooms, a doll perched on the kitchen bench supervising breakfast, and at least two jukeboxes we counted before we stopped being able to focus on anything except the eyes.
For SaleLion Around: Geelong's Lion-Statue Mansion
Made the list for fourteen lion statues, a billiard room where the photos have colonised the ceiling, a garage named The Stables with a coat of arms above the door, and a wine cellar with a porthole window looking up through the floor of the pool.
SoldThe 3.4 Metre Wonder
Made the list for being so narrow a tape measure is the most alarming thing about the listing — and for hiding a clawfoot bath in the side passage that no plumber could fully explain.
Not currently for saleKnights of the Yellow Kitchen Table
Made the list for a fully themed Crusader meeting room — armour, banners and a round table built for chivalry — and that's before you even reach the private theatre.
For SalePretty in Pink: Nambucca Heads' Daggiest Beach Pad
Made the list for being three bedrooms with three completely different colour philosophies — and not one of them is white.
For SaleThe Earth Castle
Made the list for having functional drawbridges, a cascading indoor waterfall, a secret room behind the wine cellar, and a living grass roof you can do yoga on while overlooking the valley.
For SaleThis House Comes With A Bonus Western Town
Made the list for an entire hand-built Wild West town — saloon, jail, church, courthouse, general store, theatre and brothel included — sitting on 12.5 acres behind a perfectly normal modern three-bedroom home.
SoldThe Sandcastle House
Made the list for a hand-corbelled limestone turret nobody wanted to build, a moat you cross on stepping stones because apparently the drawbridge budget ran out, gothic light fittings the owner spotted at Disneyland and simply had to have, and a cheetah-skin runner laid down the spiral stair for reasons the listing does not attempt to explain.
SoldIvy League: Darling Point
Made the list for being a genuine c1920s Darling Point trophy home, renovated by a celebrity interior designer and sold for $21 million, that still found room for a rooster portrait hung with pride in the one room dedicated to eating things that used to have feathers, a kitchen bench that looks like the marble ran out halfway through the pour, and a staircase runner striped enough to double as a field sobriety test.
Buy stuff from the houses.
We found the houses. We tracked down the vibe. We did the hard work so you can impulse-buy a cheetah-print cushion at 11pm and call it interior design.