Information you will need
At the very least you need to know:
- the house number
- the name of the street.
Other useful information is:
- the lot number
- the Council ward in which the house is situated.
Finding the lot number of the house
The Local History Collection at the Bowen Library has sectional maps of the Randwick Municipality on microfiche. The sectional maps divide the Municipality into sections. Each microfiche has information such as:
- lot numbers
- lot sizes
- locations of easements
- Department of Planning numbers.
There is an accompanying map divided into grids. Once you have determined the number of the grid in which your house falls:
- take out the microfiche with the corresponding number
- use the microfiche reader to find your street
- each lot shows the house number, for example 156
- at the front of each lot shown on the microfiche there is a number
- this is the lot number.
The sectional maps are located in the blue microfiche box NSW-15.
Finding which ward the house is in
There is a current map of Council ward boundaries in Randwick 1859-1976 (Catalogue Call Number LH994.41/Ran). This map will give you an idea of which ward the house may fall in.
A few dates to remember:
- Central Ward was created in 1954
- South Ward was created in 1892
- Coogee and West Wards were created in 1875.
You need to know which ward the house is in because Council Rate Books are organised by wards.
Once you have the lot number of the house and you know in which ward it is situated, you can move on to the Randwick Municipality Rate Books (1859-1926). The rate books can only narrow the age of a house to a year; however, they can provide other useful information.
The rate books
The rate books are arranged by ward and then alphabetically by street. The streets are then divided into sides. For example:
- South side and north side
- East sde and west side.
The rate books are available on microfilm in the Local Studies room at the Bowen Library (Drawer 11). The information they provide is varied. Information that can be discovered includes:
- the name of the house
- the owner
- the occupier
- the profession of the owner.
Usually they just list:
- the lot number
- the owner
- the rate levied on the property
- in the earlier books house names are sometimes recorded.
There are two columns in the rate books:
- Unimproved Capital Value
- Improved Capital Value.
These help to determine whether there is a building on the land.
- If the figure in the unimproved capital value and improved capital value are the same then there is not a building
- If the improved capital value is more than the capital value then there is a building on the property
- You just need to trace the house back until you reach the year where the capital values are the same.