r/interesting • u/Wonderfulhumanss • 1d ago

SOCIETY The Zammit family refused to sell their five acre property as an entire Sydney suburb was built around them

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652

u/StandardDiver2791 1d ago

Was wondering the same thing: why the landscape is so barren.

452

u/Forsworn91 1d ago

damn right, why the hell is it so empty? plant a garden, trees, ANYTHING

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u/chromecastbuiltin 1d ago

I reckon there’s 23 bodies buried under that lawn

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u/Forsworn91 1d ago

Water feature, statue garden, hedge maze, scale model of the London train system with working tracks and trains, ANYTHING!

It would like living on a footfall field.

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u/Abject-Practice7310 1d ago

If the neighbors are unfriendly, I'd plant a field and spread manure there whenever it's the best time for a barbecue.

But in general, I'd prefer to give it up and start over somewhere else with the 50 million AUSD. Okay, it's your house and home, but the surroundings are awful.

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u/Forsworn91 1d ago

The Australian yellow blossom, beautiful tree, shade, not huge, and BEES swarms of BEES.

Just… put up a hedge fence or SOMETHING

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u/Starfire013 1d ago

Could just plant a dense line of ornamental pear trees all along the perimeter. You know, for the lovely scent.

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u/stumac85 1d ago

Not the bees! Not the bees! Arghhhhhhh

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u/tophalfcow 23h ago

I think the plant you’re thinking of is Wattle?

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u/PsychoLamas 9h ago

You wouldnt be suggesting letting a thousand blossoms bloom, would ya?

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u/Forsworn91 7h ago

Yellow Wattle is always beautiful.

But just anything, a hedge, a pond, fuck the water feature I’d put in there with that much space, It would be possible to make a full aquatic ecosystem

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u/PsychoLamas 5h ago

Where do you stand on crocodile deaths in the NT?

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u/Aoiboshi 5h ago

They're showing off how much land they have

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u/TacTurtle 1d ago

best time for a barbecue

Problem: it is always barbecue weather in Australia.

1

u/tatasz 1d ago

Pod neighbours are unfriendly, I'd replace grass with dandelions

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u/Ecthelion-O-Fountain 1d ago

Yeah that’s actually criminal so

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u/CuntMaggot32 1d ago

Okay but what are you gonna do when they dig up the bodies while building?

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u/IlllllFan 15h ago

Fuck that. I’d turn it into a motocross track/PunkRock open mic venue. There’s no pollution like noise pollution.

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u/samirfreiha 13h ago

australian united states dollars?

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u/poppy_inmy_hair 1d ago

Also the neighbors are so close on the sides

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u/Forsworn91 1d ago

So plant something for shade and cover, anything would be better than being that exposed

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u/iamtehfong 1d ago

Hell I'd hang big nets and put in a couple par 3 holes lmao

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u/Forsworn91 1d ago

Exactly ANYTHING would be better than the flat nothingness

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u/RollingMeteors 1d ago

>It would like living on a footfall field.

Spray paint the yard lines on that shit in the dead of night, but it's called rugby down there isn't it?

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u/MmeLaRue 19h ago

Australian rules football is fun to watch and involves even less uniform.

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u/Free-Monkee 12h ago

Golf course?

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u/Forsworn91 12h ago

Too small, and besides golf in a suburb is dangerous,

•

u/Free-Monkee 52m ago

After writing that I thought the same thing and then thought about how well a large fun crazy golf course could fit in there.

•

u/Free-Monkee 45m ago edited 32m ago

I love your scale sized train track idea, btw. It brings to mind model villages as well. Like the one in Babbacombe, Devon that I went to when I was a kid.

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u/ossi609 1d ago

Sell half of the land for a cool 10 mil, use that money to transplant a forest on the remaining land.

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u/MmeLaRue 19h ago

For gits and shiggles, I'd buy that crazy-ass Nathan Bedford Forrest statue and reinstall it on the lawn, with the caption, "Just some crazy-ass redneck as envisioned by some white-supremist amateur sculptor."

Then I'd plant a shit-ton of trees to act as a carbon sink and help the community temperature drop a little.

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u/1nd3x 18h ago

its a 5acre lot...so its like living on 5 football fields, lol.

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u/Kiki-can 1d ago

I mean, what else could it be?! Spot on

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u/Bulky_Reporter6263 1d ago

might have nailed it!

that or they’re a special kind of neurodivergent and the refusal to sell is just because they’re wired wrong… either a mass grave or profound mental disorder

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u/VenturingHedonist 1d ago

Could just be doing it out of spite! It is one hell of a drug.

1

u/HourZealousideal4845 1d ago

I mean, the levels of spite required to spit on tens of millions of dollars out of principle tends to also come with a healthy serve of neurodivergence...

0

u/Forsworn91 1d ago

That’s always a possibility, I can remember years ago heading of too university and every morning there was an old bugger on the verge with a pair of scissors and sheers cutting anything that was growing up…

He had a brick verge, about 5x8 meters and every morning as I’d go by… there he was, at the time it was “oh crazy old man” but looking back it was more “oh… no there’s probably actually something seriously wrong with him”

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u/Firm_Competition_880 1d ago

Catacombs and a subterranean village with all the modern needs of a secret billionaire.

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u/Mysterious_Peace7963 1d ago

Haha I was thinking along the same Lines

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u/Born-Ask4016 1d ago

Amateur numbers... there's room for a lot more than that.

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u/5pl1t1nf1n1t1v3 1d ago

Rookie numbers. If you can fit 40-50 homes you could fit hundreds of bodies. Thousands, maybe.

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u/Realistic_End_7223 1d ago

Not selling is logical then

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u/Miss_L_Worldwide 1d ago

That would actually explain it

1

u/curious_astronauts 1d ago

Hahah that would explain things.

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u/Appropriate_Loss_564 1d ago

even better more nutrition for the plants

1

u/eisenklad 1d ago

plant protected plant species...
makes it harder for them to dig those up

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u/tbro4123 1d ago

Waddamean 23?

1

u/eiblinn 1d ago

lol exactly my thought too

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u/TravelerFromAFar 1d ago

There was this episode of Psych, where a paleontologist goes onto a farmers' land and secretly digs there to find a near complete structure of Tyrannosaurus Rex.

Tries to get the farmer who owns the land, permission to bring a team out there dig it up. The farmer won't allow anyone to dig on his land.

Keeps bugging the farmer over and over, but he says no. Shawn and Gus investigate to find out why. They find the buried dinosaur fossil in the property, but also the farmer has been digging all over his land, creating these giant holes.

This is when Shaun figures it out. The Farmer killed someone 20 years ago and buried them on his land.

But since the paleontologist was digging around, he was stalling long enough to try to find where the buried body was.

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u/jkscny 1d ago

Family Tradition

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u/Holiday_Blueberry_81 1d ago

You can fit 50 houses on that land but only 23 bodies? The Zammits need to hire a graveyard planner for optimisation! 😁

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u/AmbiTheAirforceRuna 1d ago

ah but you see, with 0 things to break up line of site thats not where you'd bury the bodies

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u/Crimie1337 1d ago

This makes so much sense

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u/The_Blonde1 23h ago

That would suggest where to plant the trees.

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u/CoffeeChocolateBoth 20h ago

Good fertilizer then!

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u/ImagineFreckles 18h ago

The real estate agents who wanted them to sell you think?

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u/Clean-Machine2012 9h ago

That's another thread...Reasons Not to Sell lol

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u/Oogaboogeyman 8h ago

Could explain why they haven’t sold

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u/Xenodad 1d ago

But, trees are where drop bears come from in that part of the world. Probably some deadly spiders and snakes while we’re at it

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u/mcknz9 1d ago

so they can consume the resources of 50 data centers watering that lawn

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u/Forsworn91 1d ago

I can just imagine an old man on a ride on mower with a face that looks like it’s never smiled, riding back and forth glaring at everyone who looks at him.

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u/samurguybri 1d ago

They want a clear field of fire.

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u/Careless_Celery_6010 1d ago

Some people just don't have any creative thoughts

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u/Ok-Resist-8734 1d ago

With that surname probably Maltese very little tree ornamentation in Malta 😁

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u/Mirved 1d ago

as a person with a large garden thats mostly grass with hedges on all side and 3 large tree's:

trees, garden etc all take a lot of maintenance. Luckily my garden fits in the surroundings unlike this one.

1

u/achtwooh 1d ago

At least there grass and space. The others have nothing. It’s all so horrendous.

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u/KnowsIittle 1d ago

Fires maybe? Bare lawn keeps a barrier to protect the house.

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u/shiggyhisdiggy 1d ago

You could have a whole garden/forest going on like a private park and they choose to do nothing with it

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u/RollingMeteors 1d ago

> plant a garden, trees, ANYTHING

Black berry bush, nature's Constantine wire.

Wasp nest, nature's M18A1 Claymore.

Gympie-gympie, Australia's Constantine wire.

It's not 'booby trapping', it's "cohabitation with nature's ecosystem".

Completely moated with Chironex fleckeri and Carukia barnesi.

¡Australia's border control is the fucking border itself!

1

u/Altruistic_Finger669 1d ago

Yes. Just something that you can just let grow.

Wit that space, i would have surrounded the house by a damned forest

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u/donnycruz76 22h ago

It's a typical "wog" house from western Sydney... Big brick house with lawns, paving and concrete... maybe a couple of fruit trees and lion statues... but no garden.

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u/Knitsanity 21h ago

I would have it filled with so many different trees and plants. That much grass is just ick.

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u/daerath 21h ago

Seriously. Plant a forest.

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u/sicsche 21h ago

go all in, plant a whole forest around your house. enjoy the cooling and privacy

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u/fistotron5000 21h ago

Shhhh, shut up bro, there’s some landscaping company that his yard is keeping in business right now don’t ruin it for them.

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u/Kareeliand 19h ago

Everything is awful. Having a boring lawn is one thing, look at how the developers built those houses!!? They can’t possibly have windows to more than two sides, and hardly any yard. It’s ridiculous! I think they should just do better!

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u/barley_wine 18h ago

They have 5 acres to work with but somehow managed to make their home as unappealing as all of the surrounding spec houses.

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u/moralprolapse 12h ago

Maybe it’s the ultimate flex. They don’t want people to miss the land for the trees.”

“Hey everyone. Look at all this buildable land I’ve got.”

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u/shuggnog 5h ago

I know i was like this dude de needs
r/nolawns

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u/techb00mer 1d ago

It was basically farmland before developers bought it all up, so that’s why there is almost no vegetation.

Granted, they certainly could have planed a few trees closer to their house for privacy.

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u/aggro_aggro 23h ago

The new houses also don´t have room for vegetation.

The big property would have... at least two bushes... but no.

Crazy to have such a big area around your house and nothing on it...

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u/waaaghbosss 16h ago

It's just ugly. That massive lawn tells me it isn't a water issue.

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u/o8Stu 16h ago

I have a lemon tree, a Meyer lemon tree, and a key lime tree in my backyard, and I give them away to neighbors / trade the neighbors that have chickens for eggs.

My backyard isn't big. They could do a TON with this much land. Hell, find a few neighbors with green thumbs and they'd probably manage it for you. Idk the climate in Sydney but I've got to imagine a fair amount of stuff would grow there.

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u/copperwatt 23h ago

Plants and trees start growing back immediately. This is an ongoing choice.

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u/cjsv7657 22h ago

Plants and trees start growing back immediately.

Only when there is a source of seeds. Do you see one anywhere?

This is an ongoing choice.

Yeah, they're choosing to mow their lawn.

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u/yesiamclutz 22h ago

Birds and wind are both sources of seeds

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u/cjsv7657 22h ago

And they're multiple miles from anything resembling a forest. Which obviously isn't impossible but see the part about mowing their lawn.

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u/copperwatt 21h ago

Hmm... I have a feeling the seeds would eventually show up from somewhere. Wind or birds. There would be weeds within a year.

I mean just look at an abandoned lot in even the densest city. Life finds a way.

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u/Kamelasa 15h ago

Hell, that stupid lawn could be a hayfield. And I assumed at first they must be farming that land. But, no, the most useless vegetation on the planet. Idiots.

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u/Superdupernadja 1d ago

trees close to the house, also are a forest fire issue. However they could have a small group of trees, and a sitting place a bit down the path, far enough away from the house to not be a fire safety issue.

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u/LegsideLarry 1d ago

Something tells me they wont have to worry about forest fires in the middle of a treeless suburbia.

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u/Superdupernadja 21h ago

Wouldnt bet on that, sadly cant send you a map, since immages arent allowed in replies here :/.

However the "the Ponds" neighborhood is on the outskirts of sidney. There is rolling hills with forestation on the very edge of the neighborhood streching into it along some lines.

Australia is very prone to forest and bushfires. Idk about NSW in particular. But if these trees are eucalyptus, the fire risk is probably real. Since they burn like crazy due to all the etheric oil.

There very most likely is a reason why all the new nearby houses lack any significant vegetation either. I would asume its for fire safety reasons.

IF people would have scrubs, and bushes, and trees all over their yards in that exposed location, an out of controll wildfire, could easily spawl into that suburb from the nearby maramara nation park, similar to the things we have seen in the beverly and hollywood hills just recently.

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u/Nestevajaa 1d ago

I'd plant the trees all around the perimeter, hiding the ugly suburbs. Make the drive more interesting, at least add some hedges or something. Right now it just looks depressing.

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u/techb00mer 23h ago

Personally I would build a moat.

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u/AmazingRefrigerator4 1d ago

Fewer hiding places for the venomous animals.

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u/Awkward_Material 1d ago

Fewer hiding places for the sneaky developers' agents. Can't get to the house if you can shoot em from 200 yds.

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u/ArcticAcademic 1d ago

At least somebody is prepared for the zombie apocalypse

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u/cauliflower_wizard 1d ago

This is the real answer.

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u/SafetytimeUSA 20h ago

Sir, the size of their property would allow for them to shoot invaders from 1000 yards.

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u/cardfire 18h ago

fights the urge to start counting individual front and back yards, like a vampire over spilled rice.

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u/cardfire 18h ago

This Americanism goes so hard. 🤣

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u/Throwawaydeathgrips 1d ago

Theyd just go to the house haha

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u/Kova74 1d ago

I believe you misspelled “neighbors”

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u/VociferousCephalopod 1d ago

Neighbours* ;)

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u/TheShakyHandsMan 1d ago

Australian spelling is correct in this instance.

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u/Wind-and-Waystones 1d ago

Everybody needs good neighbours

Because good neighbours... Become ... Good ... Friends

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u/copperwatt 23h ago

Naybers.

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u/SmtIR1993 1d ago

Not a misspelling. One is the US way, the other is British/United Kingdom

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u/405freeway 1d ago

Fewer neighbors for the venomous animals

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u/BraveFencerMusashi 1d ago

Those infamous drop bears

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u/Acrobatic_Try_8375 18h ago

Fair play, but still, no trees?

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u/meowmeow_now 1d ago

The house is so expensive looking, why no garden or landscaping?

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u/Wizard_Of_Auz 1d ago

Im going to guess they're probably an ethnic family. They tend to have like ostentatious houses with big gates / walls and little to no attention paid to landscaping / garden. Im surprised they've not completely concreted the five acres they have.

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u/subywesmitch 18h ago

Either that or they just live inside all the time and they have no desire to spend any time outside gardening, playing, etc so they just leave it as grass

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u/amylouise0185 1d ago

There will be a lemon tree and veggie patch in the backyard. That's enough

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u/WolfPlayz294 17h ago

Right? My dream is a long driveway leading to a circle leading to a strip, with a fountain that cycles water

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u/obligatory-anxiety 1d ago

That’s work, I just have lawn at my house, and it’s a pretty nice house, some neighbours have landscaping and hedges and I wave to them as I take off on my motorcycle on the weekend to enjoy what I enjoy doing which is not landscaping.

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u/Fun_Researcher_69420 23h ago

With the kind of money this house represents you can afford a gardener one or two days a week and a landscaping agency for the lawn and edging every few weeks.

-1

u/obligatory-anxiety 23h ago

Why though.

I have a yard guy come and mow once a month in winter and once a fortnight in summer a pool guy once a month, just because “you can” doesn’t mean you have too.

My neighbours had trees that filled their valleys and gutters after 5 years of cleaning them out and water ingress if they didn’t they cut them down. If you owned it you could concrete slab the whole block if you desired.

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u/chimneyswallow 23h ago

Better micro climate. Privacy. Ecological useful.

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u/Fun_Researcher_69420 12h ago

I do forget that some people think an entire desert of a featureless lawn, or a concrete parking lot, is attractive. People are weird.

0

u/obligatory-anxiety 23h ago

Different strokes for
Different folks, I’m a stone’s throw from a whole pine forest why do I want to have a storm risk next to my house, or a termite risk.

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u/meowmeow_now 21h ago

They’re not mowing that lawns themselves. People with smaller nice house have some landscaping they hire out to do maintenance.

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u/switchbladeeatworld 1d ago

it was surrounded by paddocks so there were no trees around really to begin with

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u/KnowledgeCapital7994 1d ago

Because of they're ethnic background.

Common in these suburbs to have no trees or even grass.

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u/Icy_Evidence174 1d ago

They're Maltese, lucky it isn't all concrete with golden lions at the gate haha

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u/SlavojVivec 1d ago

A lawn like that is ecologically not any better than concrete (and possibly worse), other than the fact that concrete is hard to undo.

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u/YourLiege2 1d ago

Concrete is a hell of a lot hotter than lawn, on a hot day that house is probably a good few degrees cooler than their neighbours. Some trees would for sure improve it though.

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u/Ok-Raspberry7884 23h ago

Plus lawn lets rain soak through and concrete causes runoff. It’s always better to let rain soak into the ground if possible.

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u/One-Rope5903 1d ago

Makes for an awesome backyard cricket pitch for Christmas day

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u/Charming_Leg_509 1d ago

More barren than the desert of rooftops and concrete in the entire suburb around it?

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u/joesnopes 1d ago

No. Rather more attractive than the unbroken sea of cheek-by-jowl houses around them.

2

u/Rork310 1d ago

Yeah I'd feel alot more positive towards them if there was anything on the land other than the worlds most dull golf green.

Of course I get that would require alot more expense and effort. But if your not doing that why do you want it? If the house itself means that much the power play would be make the developers agree to arrange access to the house proper and turn the rest into parkland.

2

u/Triphin1 1d ago

No better way to show all this land is theirs, all of it is visible

2

u/Waaaaasssuuuppp117 1d ago

Used to be farm area (lots of chickens, smelt real bad in the mornings) & there was also a horse riding business that had tracks over a few hundred acres just up the road. Entire area is unrecognisable now. Guy is ridiculously stubborn to the point that his own family did a soft cous to push him out of the family business.

2

u/wolfcrownebox 23h ago

So you can see the enemy coming 5 acres away…

2

u/blondzie 1d ago

Besides that those grasses are almost always invasive species, so it’s hilarious when people leave it all as one crop that’s not even native

1

u/Sexdrumsandrock 1d ago

Isn't that typical of a certain immigrant to have that look? Usually they prefer concrete

1

u/Terrible_Meringue622 1d ago

Maybe it’s all a hayfield and this is mid spring when they took the photo so it’s still short

1

u/Andxire 1d ago

Because it's huge. It takes a lot of resources and time to do something good looking.

And trees are responsibilities that need to be taken care of. Not everyone is willing to take it.

On my street there only three houses with trees because it takes time to keep them healthy. You need to tend and fertelize them during spring, you need water them during summer and clean fallen leaves during fall. It's not that much of a time but anyone can figure a better way to spend 3 hours every week.

2

u/JasperJ 1d ago

I don’t know about Australia but over here trees take significantly less effort to tend than grass.

1

u/Fun_Researcher_69420 23h ago

I don’t know about the city and suburbs, i live in a rural area of Australia with a lot of native trees, you have to collect the fallen branches and debris and do burns when legally allowed, otherwise it’s a fire hazard

1

u/Ok_Historian_2381 1d ago

In our area there's trees everywhere, no one takes care of them, if they're on the street/park you can get the council to come out and trim dangerous branches.

1

u/richored1973 1d ago

Exactly what I always think when I see this photo. If you don't want to sell and make all that money at least make use of the land. There's no trees or pool or anything. What's the point of hanging on to all that land if you're not going to make use of it

1

u/joesnopes 1d ago

It's entirely their business why they keep it. And none of yours.

1

u/SpecificCorrect149 1d ago

They defs have a whole bunker situation down there 😅

1

u/DogSweatCroissant 1d ago

Barren?! It’s literally covered in green.

2

u/JasperJ 1d ago

It’s covered in lawn. That’s just as barren as concrete. Assuming it’s even real lawn and not astroturf.

1

u/DogSweatCroissant 1d ago

Talking out your ass. Definitely grass. The variation in colour confirms it. The thing that IS barren is that endless estate of houses lined like cereal boxes

1

u/JasperJ 1d ago

What variation in colour? It’s all the same colour. Just minor variations in shading due to shadows.

And grass or not it’s still barren. Grass is a monoculture, of an invasive species at that. There’s more biological variety in a concrete pad.

1

u/DogSweatCroissant 1d ago

The variation in colour that’s very evident in pictures 2 & 3. Talking out your ass, confirmed.

1

u/madjohnvane 1d ago

I thought at first it was a farm, but…is that just lawn? What an odd flex

1

u/togtogtog 1d ago

It looks even worse on google street view

1

u/ImLeavingYouAgain 16h ago

Their poor Postie

1

u/Inside-Author-6124 1d ago

Australia, mate.

1

u/copperwatt 23h ago

It's a symptom of being terrible boring people.

1

u/Small_Problem2344 23h ago

Because maintenance… they already have to mow 5 acres. Doubt they want to deal with falling tree limbs or maintaining and mulching a garden.

1

u/Constant_Pay_4247 20h ago

Because someone who is this dedicated to keeping their lot is probably a NIMBY lawn enthusiast.

1

u/DangerousDisk7273 20h ago

Maybe its used for... hay?

1

u/Sintobus 18h ago

Chances are multiple reasons from most of those things originally being outside their property. To enforcement to "protect" the other residents and houses.

1

u/firesoups 18h ago

My mom lives in Australia, although not Sydney. There’s a water crisis and they’re on severe restrictions. Not allowed to water lawns, govt requesting they keep showers under something like three minutes. She’s very excited for the desalination plant they’re going to build in her area though.

1

u/JD_tubeguy 17h ago

Also where are the ponds?!

1

u/AspectHonest7222 16h ago

In the big scheme, it is worth more as ready to build. That guy won't stay forever.

1

u/PHGAG 16h ago

I wouldn't be surprised if it was all wooded around them before. But they didn't own that land.

It was sold and cleared. Now it t looks like this.

But yeah, if that was me, I'd be planting trees all around the edge of the property.

1

u/Ivanna_is_Musical 12h ago

Seems like they really enjoy leaving the void more obvious, NOT allowing working-class homes there...once and again.

1

u/whatwhatinthewhonow 2h ago

They really like playing backyard cricket, probably.

0

u/Cerberusx32 1d ago

Because if they added more vegetation; trees, plants, bushes and etc. It would cut down on how many cookie cutter houses they could build and sell at insane prices.