As land continues to be a hot commodity on the Sunshine Coast, a trend is emerging where families are buying up streets to create a “modern village”.
With humble suburbs like Aroona, Nambour and Woombye hitting million-dollar sales, families are now looking at ways to be close to each other without the hefty price tag and first home buyers are finding alternative ways to get their foot in the property door.
This is seeing a wave of “generational buying” in growing master planned communities, including Harmony at Palmview.
Agents are also seeing a surge in parents lending equity on already owned property.
Queensland project director Anthony Demiris, of Harmony developer Avid Property Group, said it was no longer just a case of going to the bank of mum and dad for a deposit to enter the market.
He told Sunshine Coast News more parents were going guarantor to help their children secure a loan from the bank.
“There’s been a real emergence of parent guarantees, so mum and dad using their own homes as equity to help their children have enough security to buy their home,” Mr Demiris said.
“This is very prolific for young buyers.”
Mr Demiris said there had also been examples of siblings pooling their savings to purchase a home together.
“I’m aware of siblings that have bought together to get themselves into the property market.
“There is one example where a sibling is a (fly-in, fly-out) worker, so they might not be there for a few weeks at a time while the other sibling is in the house, so they co-exist that way.”
Another trend taking off is generations of one family buying individual blocks of land in close proximity.
Mr Demiris said Harmony was seeing a mixture of first home buyers, second and third property buyers and parents or grandparents looking to downsize and be close to their children.
“We are seeing a lot of demand for parents and adult children to want to live close to each other,” he said.
“There is a lot of acceptance for grandparents to come and buy in Harmony to be in close proximity to children and the grandkids to provide that support for families.
“We are also seeing a demand for parents of university age children trying to buy a property as an investment for their children to live in.”
In term of demographics, these generational buying trends have seen a diverse range of ages looking to buy in communities such as Harmony, from first home buyers right up to retirees.
The Palmview development is about 45 per cent sold and Mr Demiris said more than 90 per cent of buyers were owner occupiers, with one third of them first home buyers.
“What we are finding at Harmony is we’re seeing a really diverse mix of buyers and residents. It’s certainly no one predominant buyer,” he said.
“We have done 2200 sales so far and roughly 1500 families are currently living in Harmony.
“We are over 90 per cent owner occupier, which is very unique particularly for the scale of Harmony. You would usually see 70 to 80 per cent owner occupier.
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“From a community perspective you’ve got nine out of 10 houses in a street that are owner occupier, so they’re house proud, they are growing families and they are involved in the community.”
He said most buyers were looking for a four-bedroom, double garage home with two bathrooms and two living areas.
Set on 378 hectares, Harmony will deliver more than 4800 homes for 12,000 future residents, surrounded by 100 hectares of open space and the future delivery of a new town centre.
More than 9000 short-term jobs will be generated through the delivery of the project.
