Where We Work
Bendigo and the surrounding shire. But the suburb matters for more than travel time — it usually tells you what the house is sitting on before anyone visits.
Bendigo’s housing splits into three eras, and the era decides the job. Some suburbs are almost entirely one type. A few are all three. And one whole group of suburbs can’t be restumped at all.
Find your suburb, and you've half-answered the question
Three things determine which service applies, and the first two are usually settled by where you live:
- Does the house sit on stumps or a slab? Broadly, pre-1980 Bendigo housing is on stumps; newer estate housing is on a slab. A slab home can’t be restumped — there’s nothing to replace. Not sure which you have? The two-minute check is here.
- Which stump generation? Gold-era houses are on original timber, possibly 170 years in the ground. Post-war houses are on second-generation stumps now reaching end of life.
- Is the ground moving, or just the stumps? The only question the suburb can’t answer for you — that takes floor levels across the house and a look underneath.
Restumping, reblocking, underpinning and jack and pack — the difference →
Gold-era suburbs — original timber stumps
Inside or adjacent to the goldfield. Housing from the 1850s to the 1910s, mostly weatherboard on original timber stumps that have now been in central Victorian clay for well over a century. Failing at ground line is the expected outcome, not a surprise.
| Suburb | What’s characteristic |
|---|---|
| Golden Square | Two housing eras interleaved — 1880s boom housing with later Edwardian infill, which means two stump generations sometimes on one street |
| Long Gully | Named after a gully, and a gully is a drainage line. Water is the mechanism behind every failure mode, and here it’s a feature of the topography |
| Ironbark | The deep-shaft heart of the field. Those shafts were capped rather than filled — and depth isn’t what moves houses anyway |
| Eaglehawk | Its own borough for 132 years. Shallow alluvial working left “upside down country” — reworked ground at the depth footings actually sit |
| Quarry Hill | Workers’ cottages alongside villas, and villas often combine brick on footings with timber on stumps — two foundations in one house |
| Kangaroo Flat | All three housing generations in one postcode. The first question here is whether you have stumps at all |
| California Gully | Gold-era housing on original stumps. Like Long Gully, named for the gully that was worked — so drainage and reworked ground are the first things to check |
| Specimen Hill | Miners’ cottage housing, low subfloor clearance, tight original blocks. Access frequently drives the cost more than the stump count does |
| White Hills | Established tram-era development. Mixed stock, with a good proportion on second-generation stumps rather than originals |
Common to all of them: low subfloor clearance, narrow side access, a century of additions built without engineering input, and previous packing under the house. All four push labour up, and labour is most of the cost of this work. What that means for price →
Post-war suburbs — second-generation stumps
Built roughly 1950s to 1970s, generally on concrete stumps that replaced nothing — these houses were built that way. Those stumps are now 50 to 75 years old, which is genuinely the age at which this becomes a live question.
| Suburb | What’s characteristic |
|---|---|
| Flora Hill | Post-war housing, better subfloor clearance than the gold-era stock, which makes the work faster and cheaper |
| Kennington | Same era. Established trees close to houses are a common driver of uneven soil moisture here |
| North Bendigo | Post-war stock with original earthenware stormwater lines that crack as clay moves |
| Bendigo East | Similar. Mixed with some earlier housing towards the centre |
Why this group matters: post-war housing is the sweet spot for jack and pack. The stumps are frequently still structurally sound while the house has settled, which is exactly the situation packing suits — at a fraction of the cost of restumping. It’s also the option most often left unmentioned, because there’s limited margin in it.