Hi all,
This is my first post as I have just joined. I am currently in th UK but have a couple of apartments for sale in Port Macquarie on NSW mid north coast. The thing is when I bought them off plan they were a great buy now it seems very hard to sell them. Anyone have any ideas on the market and if it has dropped??
Thanks
BJMACA[/font=Verdana]
I exchange on something there shortly that I bought off the plan. It has proven to be a great punt – 30% gain on bank val since exchange 2 years ago. Having said that, I’m not trying to flog it.
I was up there a week ago to do a pre-settlement inspection. The amount of building activity in town is amazing. There are numerous blocks going up, so position i.e. proximity to the beach and town, are critical. The usage intention of the property is also important.
From what I can gather, lots of the blocks going up are aimed at owner occupiers – heaps of retirees up there. The block I bought into is aimed solely at the holiday market. Agents have said there has been a net drain of holiday accomodation as the old walk-up apartments have been bulldozed to make way for owner occupier blocks.
There are plenty of apartments on the market. Off-the-plan sales are still happening. Some apartments are for sale in finished buildings. Others are being on-sold prior to settlement.
So, from my observation:
1. Supply up there would be outstripping demand.
2. The apartment market in Port M may be suffering irrationally because apartments in Sydney are out of favour – lots of Port buyers live in Sydney.
3. It’s winter, and Port is largely a holiday town.I’m assuming your apartments haven’t dropped in value, but I’m not surprised it’s proving tough to sell them.
Where are the apartments?
Scott
Hi BJ
My wife and I run a buyers agents in Newcastle just south of Port Macquarie.Scott was spot on with his appraisal of Port. When the “development age” started about 5 years ago everyone started looking for cheap coastal properties (in comparison with Sydney) to develop.
There is an oversupply of units being built on the coast, especially in Newcastle as all the DA’s that have been put in over the last 5-7 years are now being built.
We highly recommend before buying units off the plan, see how unique they are. There are hundreds of boxes being built and they are the ones being caught in the oversupply. If your unit has water views or any other specialalities that make them more appealing than your standard boxes, you will be more successful in selling them.
Unfortunately for Port there are only a couple of major developers so most of the units there look very similar.
We have a client who purchased there 2 months ago. They were looking at a new 2 bedroom unit near the beach at around $400k. We found one 3 streets further back that was 4 years old had 3 bedrooms and a 2nd bath, double garage and payed $325k.
Another problem is that a majority of these units are owned by capital city investors who read the prospectus and hoped to sell before completion, however they didn’t realise that there would be 30 blocks of units on the market not just theirs.
My personal opinion is hold on to it if you can and make as much from holiday rentals as you can or find out what the other units are going to be rented for and make yours $5-$10 lower rent to get it tenanted, or if you want to sell, find out what the others are on for and go $5-10k lower. There will be more growth in Port eventually but its up to you decide which way you want to go.
We hope you havent been too scarred by this learning experience and are growing from it.
Just to make you feel a little better, its probably warmer over there today than it is here.
Good luck, email me if you would like some more info,
regards
MicHunter House Hunters.
Specialising in finding your dream home in Newcastle and the Hunter Valley or your perfect investment property throughout Australia.To join our database [email protected]Thanks for the advice.
We have not been scared off just annoyed by the Real Estate agents not telling us the full story. I am not concerned about the price going down as they have uninterupted water views. But we now need to go through the hassle of renting them.
Also your comment was correct we have had 30 degress here for the past 3 days. Yipeee
Cheers
BJMACA
If they’re new and they’ve got uninterrupted views, I’m wondering if they’re in the Observatory. It’s a great building in a great spot.
keep them.they are in a fantastic spot and the rent returns will be phenominal!
sg
The Views are great, The spot is great the problem I have is that I have overstretched myself a bit to much. Due to being in the UK and having excellent opportunities where the Rent covers my mortgage payments I went out on a limb. So I need to work out how to cover the mortgage payments whilst no tennants are in.
Any ideas.
Get tenants!!!
Put pressure on your managing agent to rent yours. Offer them an incentive. Get them to show you the ad they have – rewrite if necessary (from a post that Yack made – great advice!).
Lower the rent if you have to – $10 less per week now is better than weeks vacant…
Cheers
MelThe market has slowed up and property prices look to have come down slightly but not much at all.
Talking to some real estate agents in the area indicates that its not a big issue.Jay
OK “Port”, as it is called by the locals, is God’s waiting room. This means retirees waiting to die. As the population ages what this means is that the right climate near to the coast will attract more and more people wanting their “sea change”.
Add to this the settlement point major developement of residential blocks on reclaimed swamp and you have a fair indication of “Port”.
As the roads improve(yes we wait for miracles) you will have more and more Syd/Brizzy traffic and the eventual growth associated with this becoming the major thoroughfare it has deserved to be for years.
Pricing, all over NSW you have had a 20% drop in recent months. What my Sydney house was worth in Jan was $429k, now im struggling to sell it for $369k. This in varying degrees has happened due to the “lets piss off the investors” tax on exit. Ok so the first home owners, that massive 5% of the market get a nice stamp duty exemption at the expense of investors the other 95%. Do the maths and the govt is reaping(misspelt on purpose)us for millions of extra tax.
Port will always increase as will Coffs due to climate and increasing services, but the cost of increased density is always social issues. So today’s economy boost is 10 years from now need for increased policing.
The rate of growth has been slowed but not stopped. You need to do a bit more research before you make an informed decision.
DD
Don’t sweat the small stuff,and it’s all small stuff!!
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