Help re Papakura and Pukekohe

Hi All

We are considering either Papakura or Puke to buy our first house. We know nothing about either area though :( I would prefer not to buy in the bad part(s) of town if possible. Could anyone let me know what are good.bad streets ditto areas.
Cheers
Shan

Puke has less "bad parts" than Papakura. If you look at a map, find Helvetia, Victoria, and Seddon Sts, everything within these boundaries would be considered the bad area of puke. It's also where we bought our first home, haha. Though we are used to this sort of area as it's the type of area we both grew up in.

Papakura is a lot harder to pinpoint what would be considered "bad parts", as they're wider spread and scattered. I would consider Drury, Opaheke, Rosehill, the top of Redhill (def not the bottom), Pahurehure, and Conifer Grove to be the better areas. Although there are plenty of streets in other parts of Papakura that I wouldn't have a problem buying in.

Depends on what you're used to and what your budget is.

Im in waiuku(next town over) and Pukekohe is really nice, I would choose Puke over papakura.

Edited by Sheza

have lived in puke for a few yrs, now im in tuakau have lived in the area for 7yrs and love it much nicer than papakura. its just close enough if you still like to go into city plus the train is right there.
the parts that astral_monkey have pointed out i think are correct and thats not a very big area when you look at the whole of puke.
there are other nice schools as well as hill and valley. Buckland is suppose to be a very nice school. there are 2 christrain schools and a catholic school as well. and heaps of daycare centres. there are 2 playcentres on either side of puke.

I grew up in papakura and while i miss that it is closer to manukau thats pretty much all i miss, there are no traffic lights in puke drury is the last set you will find, we have heaps of round a bouts instead which iv never had a problem with.   

If you don't know much about each area, can I ask what's drawing you to those two?

Puke is definitely out of Auckland, IMO, so you wouldn't be coming into Auckland as much compared to Papakura. Plus, it's a toll call to phone Auckland.

I haven't lived in either, but Puke does strike me as a lovely little community, it just has a nice feel to it when you drive through. The distance from Auckland would definitely be a deal breaker for me though.

Distance to Auckland might be an issue depending on where you and your DH work.

I work in Ellerslie, DH works in Papakura. It's a 15-20min drive from Pukekohe to Papakura and I catch the train from there (35-40mins through to Ellerslie). We've only been doing it like this since the start of the year, and even though I hate the train, it seems to be working for us.

Because we used to live in Papakura, we still have a habit of going through to Manukau or Botany on the weekends, but Pukekohe is growing and a lot of the major retailers are out here now (Mitre 10 Mega, Briscoes, Rebel, Harvey Norman, etc.) I'm looking forward to them putting a Farmers in too, which is planned I think for sometime in the next few years (as is a movie theatre, supposedly).

Love the small rural town feel of Pukekohe. Suits DH & I to a T. Now just have to get myself knocked up so I don't have to come all the way into Ellerslie every day!

just wondering where you decided on shanseal puke or papakura?.
we are looking at puke as well.

Does anyone know about St joseph's is it consdiered a good school?

I hear a lot about hill and valley school but not st joseph's? Is that because it's not in a desirable part of puke or it's not a good school?
Thanks

thanks blondegirl yip we are catholic. So all good thanks for your reply. i just wanted to check to see if anyone had heard good things. Thanks