YOUR NEXT BEST THING
Your Next Best Thing - Luxury Travel Magazine
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Your Next Best Thing | |||||
| By: Kate de Brito, Issure 32 – Spring 2007 | |||||
| (Property Investment – Australia’s coastline) | |||||
| INTERESTED IN A STYLISH PROPERTY ON THE COAST? REST ASSURED, YOU ARE NOT ALONE. | |||||
| Whether it’s a sea-change, tree-change or even a tee-change, Australians are hooked on the concept of finding a new life away from the bustle of the city. More than a decade after the sea-change phenomenon washed onto our shores, canny investors are still scouring the nation’s coastline for a picturesque hamlet to call home. Each year upwards of 60,000 people leave Australian cities for the coast, to join the almost 20 per cent of Australians already living there, according to leading demographer Bernard Salt. But today’s sea-changers are looking for more than just a sleepy seaside village. They want top restaurants, cafés, shops and first class amenities thrown in as well. According to property researcher Tim Lawless, from Collier International/ PRD Nationwide, cashed-up retirees, baby-boomers and families wanting a weekend escape hatch are leading the charge at coastal investment properties. “In the higher end of the market people are not concerned about monetary constraints,” says Mr Lawless. “Often they (the baby boomers) have built up a great deal of equity in their property and been through a number of property cycles, and their psyche is not necessarily to be worried about leaving an inheritance but enjoying their new ‘teenage’ years.” “They are concerned about lifestyle and about getting value for money. The market is quite sophisticated at that end and it has become important for developers to provide additional value, as the market is very savvy.” Demand for coastal properties continues to outstrip supply, so developers have gazed beyond traditional sea-change markets such as the Gold Coast – where a beachfront property can set you back an easy $10 million – to less-developed tracts of coast and smaller towns. Mandurah in Western Australia is a prime example. Buoyed by the resources boom in the west, the population is expected to grow from about 50,000 to 188,000 over the next 25 years. Upgraded freeway access and infrastructure has aided the spread, here and in other states, dramatically decreasing travelling time to major cities and creating new nests of villages up and down the coast. Some, such as the $1 billion made-to-order luxury coastal town Salt Village on the NSW Tweed Coast midway between Byron Bay and the Gold Coast, are the essence of the new sea-change – offering low-maintenance resort-style properties heaped with amenities. Think the coastal town of yesteryear but with a modern spin – beaches, parks, bicycle tracks and walkways, low-rise residential apartments and a surf club, along with up-market, bars, restaurants, and shops. “The Tweed Coast is the sea-change phenomenon writ large,” says Gordon Douglas, joint founder of PRD Nationwide. Salt and neighbouring village Casuarina Beach, developed for $1.5 billion by Consolidated Properties, illustrate the direction being taken by many developers appealing to a market nostalgic for the Summer holidays of their childhood – with all the mod cons. Major road improvements such as the Brisbane-Gold Coast Motorway and the Yelgun Chinderah Freeway linking the Gold Coast Airport to the Tweed Coast have added to the appeal of the Tweed Coast, now just 90 minutes to the Brisbane CDB and about 20 minutes from the Gold Coast. “Sea-changing city people are looking for more out of life. What they are looking for is a sense of community, and a shared attachment with their neighbours,” says Mr Douglas. Other states have also experienced a boom in areas once regarded as “off the beaten track”. Thanks to new roads and infrastructure, Hervey Bay in Queensland, Victoria's Bass Coast, South Australia's Victor Harbour and Latrobe in Tasmania are among the fastest growing areas in the country. Mr Douglas has also forecast a continued growth in top-end towns such as Mackay and Townsville, fueled by a boom in resources. Consolidated Properties recently launched a $200 million residential development in Mackay, the Royal Sands project, developed on a 52-hectare beach site at Bucasia on Mackay’s northern beaches. Consolidated is also behind the $1 billion Breakwater Quays project on the Townsville waterfront and the $600 million Bluewater Harbour development in Cairns. Despite talk of another interest rate rise and the recent lure of major lump sum contributions to superannuation by mid year 2007, Mr Douglas expects coastal properties will continue performing well as investments. “Sales numbers have dropped but prices are still holding and volumes are still high. It comes down to the scarcity value,” he says. “Anywhere where the baby boomers are going – those places with good features, near the beach or on a waterway, in desirable centres with growing populations – these will be the places that really fire. Especially at the middle and upper end of the market.” Tom Ray, CEO of the Ray Group which developed Salt Village, believes the Tweed Coast, and other newly established tracts of coastline in other states, represent investment value for money when compared with established areas such as the Gold Coast. “I am just about to move my family down to the Tweed Coast. My children are about the same age I was when my father moved us from Sydney to the Gold Coast. My father wanted something better for us,” says Mr Ray, whose property tycoon father Brian, died in a plane crash in July 2005 with wife Kathy. Low-level “beach shack” style developments have also been a feature of the new sea change in Western Australia. Massive growth in Perth has been matched by expansion up and down the coast to areas such as Mandurah and further south to Preston Beach where the $50 million Preston Beach resort will add about 130 holiday units to the existing 400 holiday homes. Other developers including Mirvac and the Satterley Property Group are now in the planning stages for further development at Preston Beach, which will add an extra 3000 residential properties to the area. Before the boom, Preston Beach had a permanent population of 11. And while the tiny team of locals might bemoan the loss of their sleepy little town, the new made-to-measure Preston Beach aims to maintain a village style atmosphere that appeals to people put off by busy, almost cosmopolitan, Mandurah. Like Tweed Heads, the growth in Mandurah and Preston Beach has been encouraged by new transport links, in this case a rail link between Perth and Mandurah and the southern freeway system linking Perth to Mandurah and Preston Beach which cuts travel time to the area down to just over one hour. In Victoria, the well-heeled of Melbourne have been finding their slice of paradise in the Bass Coast area, which includes Phillip Island. The alpine region in Victoria is also experiencing strong growth with properties around Mount Hotham and Dinner Plain surging in recent years. Recent developments include Balé Mount Hotham, a luxury sky home resort perched at the top of Mount Hotham Village where one-, two-, three- and five-bedroom homes are priced between $2.1 to $7.5 million. If it all sounds a little steep consider what it could be like in years to come. Tom Ray’s father bought their family property on Nobby’s Beach on the Gold Coast for about $40,000 in the 1970s. It was recently revalued at around $25 million. “A lot of properties now represent extraordinary value, especially when it comes to beachfront land,” says Tom Ray. “Basically there is not a lot of beachfront land left for development. These opportunities won’t last for the next 30 years.” | |||||
| Seaside Escape | |||||
| If a permanent sea change seems a little, well, too permanent for you there is also a raft of coastal developments that offer beachside living without the commitment. At the southern-most tip of the Great Barrier Reef, property developers CABE have bought five star luxury to the sleepy town of Bargara (13km outside Bundaberg, QLD). Their resort style development, Manta, is made up of privately owned apartments, which are rented out to holiday-makers for the majority of the year. The apartments come complete with resident manager, and first class finishes – think Smeg appliances, stone bench tops, and a spa in every ensuite. There is also an onsite tennis court, gym, and pool. Which means that you can enjoy owning premium beachside property hassle-free, or simply check into a private apartment for a holiday escape and have all the luxuries of home, visit Manta, Bargara, www.mantabargara.com.au | |||||
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