Sooshi Mango star Joe Salanitri selling Mt Waverley house

Sooshi Mango comedy trio founder and ethnic comedy genius Joe Salanitri is selling his $900,000-$990,000 Mt Waverley home.

And it comes with “plenty of concrete for the next owner to water on a summer night”.

Salanitri rose to fame with his laugh out loud portrayals of Italian and Greek family life, often playing the character Johnny, as part of an Ethnic Dads skit alongside his brother Carlo Salanitri, who plays Vince, and their friend Andrew Manfre, whose alter ego is Sam.

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In addition to a successful comedy career that has made them household names, and the highly popular Saucy Meatballs podcast, the trio have also launched Johnny, Vince, and Sam’s Ristorante in Lygon St.

Salanitri and wife Georgina have owned the 1/50 Fairview Rd, Mt Waverley, home for more than 10 years and taken the opportunity to improve it as they’ve grown their family.

“I have made sure I boosted the concrete in the back yard, and that’s been watered constantly,” he said.

“And we have done quite a bit of work like rendering the facade … and did the garden up over the years.

“We’ve made it more us, and more modern looking.”

But they haven’t made any changes to impact the “lived in” feeling of the home that first attracted them to it.

“We were looking for the little things from when we were young, like a space to all have dinner or a spot for a seat like my dad used to sit in when I was growing up,” Salanitri said.

He added that it was nice to have the little things behind the home life of ethnic Melbourne families that inspired much of his comedy, also featuring the way he remembered them from his childhood in his own home — though they had been forced to compromise and forgo the shaggy carpet and yellow-stained glass doors that weren’t already part of the home.

With its own driveway and a corner position, he said the townhouse felt more like a compact house than a unit — offering privacy when they needed it, against the backdrop of a well connected local community in the street.

“We love entertaining our friends and having a courtyard where we could do that,” Salanitri said.

The pair still remember the day their son Luca was being born when a near neighbour asked them to help him as his elderly wife had fallen.

Upon finding out they’d done so with their bub literally on the way, he proceeded to stop by with little gifts for months afterwards.

While his wife grew up in the Mt Waverley area, Salanitri said he’d rarely ventured further north than the Burwood Kmart while growing up in Bentleigh East.

But the area is definitely home for them now, with the family having already bought their next residence in the same suburb — and loving all that it offers.

“It’s easy to get into the city and to holiday areas on the Mornington Peninsula, and there’s great schools and parks for the kids — plus it’s a nice, safe and friendly neighbourhood,” he said.

“It’s been a great home, we just grew out of it; so it will be really sad to see it go.”

However, he did joke that his father would be very disappointed in him for putting the home on the market: “my dad would be saying never sell”.

Ray White Judd White’s Andrew Dimashki is handling the three-bedroom, two-bathroom listing and said it had been a delight working with a vendor who had him laughing at every turn, and whose home was a perfect fit for everyone from first-home buyers to families looking at the local schools and even downsizers.

“And there’s been buyers who are selling the big house they’ve had for five years in the outer areas to get into a more affluent area with the elite schools,” Mr Dimashki said.

With Chadstone shopping centre and Swinburne University also conveniently nearby, he said the home’s location was a winner in most buyers’ eyes.

The 1/50 Fairview Rd, Mt Waverley, home goes to auction at 10am on October 25.

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