Property Point

I’m a big fan of liberalism and the central belief of that philosophy that focuses on the individual and his/her rights in a capitalist, free market democracy.
However, I am clearly in the minority as the world increasingly defines people by the group to which they are seen to belong: if you are black or gay or Muslim or a woman, for example, you are allocated your group and the world is somehow supposed to view you through that lens rather than as the individual you are with your own specific views, interests, desires and expectations.
I won’t go too far into that philosophical discussion except to admit I am part of the most offensive of all groups; white, middle-aged, middle-class men. Disgusting pigs!
There was a time when the only group categorisation I knew of, apart from male and female, was Baby Boomers. There were Baby Boomers and there was everyone else.
Later the marketing people/social demographers came up with Gen X, then Gen Y or the Millennials, Gen Z … and on it goes.
I have to admit it is convenient to be able to use that age-based categorisation to assess the habits and behaviour of a particular group.
The ABC recently had a piece about Millennials in relation to real estate. It found that Millennials (born between 1981 and 1996) have been priced out of the market in big capital cities and are now looking to regional areas.
The report pointed out that the median price for a house in Sydney is $1.4m and this was forcing Millennials who live there to look for other options to buy.
The focus of the report was on one couple who have decided to buy in regional Lake Macquarie, where the median price is “just” $925,000.
The post-COVID, cyber-enabled world has created an environment where people can work from home and live regionally. That has allowed millennials to move to regional areas, become home-owners and, in many cases, keep their city jobs.
With Mackay’s median price of just under the $500,000 mark, it looks a lot more affordable than other regional centres (let alone capital cities) and there is no doubt this is driving the booming investor interest in our market.
We are also starting to see Millennials arrive and snap up properties.
The move to regional areas is having an impact on prices. The ABC report pointed out that the migration to regional Queensland centres has pushed up prices, in particular in the Gold and Sunshine coasts.
So what happens when the arrival of those Millennials pushes up the prices in those big regional centres in the south-east? Many of the people living there look further afield to less expensive regional centres to buy a home. Enter Mackay.
In Mackay we are getting price-pressure from investors who see terrific rental returns on affordable properties, Millennials and others who buy here because they can’t afford big city prices and, now, from people from the big regional centres. And then there’s the locals.
It is a dynamic environment with Mackay now very much part of the real estate story in Australia.
Mackay’s high rental yields, comparatively low sale prices, high income levels, low rental vacancies etc are all part of the story. I am not going to predict the future but I do know that local people who thought prices were too high five or six months ago and didn’t buy then are now in a higher market.
One thing locals do need to understand is that you are not just competing against other locals. It is a much bigger pool than that and the competition has money and sees this place as under-priced.

‍