Brisbane’s Million Dollar Buys – It’s A Buyers Market
Well-heeled property buyers are spending their fortunes in the safe zone of Brisbane’s inner-city, with the suburb of New Farm recording the highest number of sales over $1 million.
Figures by PRD Nationwide released yesterday show the top-end of Brisbane’s property market has concentrated around inner-city suburbs including New Farm, Bulimba and Kangaroo Point.
New Farm recorded 32 transactions above $1 million, totalling $53 million, during the six months to September 2010. In one street – Hollins Crescent – there were seven sales recorded with a combined total of $10.4 million.
However the total spend in the riverside suburb fell from $62 million for the same period in the previous year in the midst of a flagging market.
The median house price in New Farm was $1.1 million at the end of last year, according to RP Data.
Bulimba recorded the second highest number of sales over $1 million, with 24 transactions, amounting to $40.97 million.
Kangaroo Point had fewer sales over $1 million (22), but the transactions totalled more than $44.9 million.
Clayfield and Ascot rounded out the list, each recording 20 sales over $1 million amounting to more than $30 million in each suburb.
Prestige property specialist John Johnston said wealthy buyers were turning to the “safety” of the inner-city due to uncertainty in the market.
“There is certainly some hesitation at the top of the market,” he said.
“Buyers have retreated back towards the city. We’ve seen it happen before and it’s certainly the case at the minute where activity has been concentrated within 10 kilometres of the General Post Office [in the CBD].
“Naturally there is less demand for properties in suburbs further afield.”
Sprawling acreage properties in suburbs including Pullenvale, Bridgeman Downs, Burbank and Chandler were less attractive to buyers amid the flagging market, he said, and more difficult to finance.
LJ Hooker New Farm principal agent Brett Greensill said wealthy buyers were drawn to the suburb for its way of life.
“In particular we have seen baby-boomers preparing for their retirement buying in New Farm for the lifestyle,” he said.
Mr Greensill said there was also now better value for money in the suburb in the million-dollar price range.
“For example, a waterfront property may have once sold for $3 million and in today’s poor market the same property is now selling for $2 million,” he said.
PRD Nationwide residential research director Aaron Maskrey said buyer confidence in the top end of the market had not returned since the global financial crisis.
However he said “green shoots” of recovery were evident in the market.
“We were expecting a correction in the top end of the market late last year, but the rise in interest rates really stunned the market,” he said.
“There will be a correction in the market, but it will be a slow correction, because investors are yet to return to the top end of the market.”
Although the broader Gold Coast market flunked in the past year, the exclusive Broadbeach market attracted the most million-dollar-plus sales.
However, the total spend fell from $66 million to $59 million.
Monaco Street recorded the most million-dollar sales amounting to $18.4 million.
In New South Wales, the suburb of Mosman – on the northern shores of Sydney Harbour – topped the list recording a total of 192 million-dollar-plus sales. The suburb of Brighton, south of Melbourne, came second with 127 sales over $1 million.
