The tsunami-sized sea-change trend is sparking a rental crisis across two of Queensland’s top coastal cities, with weekly rents reaching record heights that rival parts of inner-city Sydney and Canberra. Some locals have been forced to squat or live in their cars.
The Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast are now among two of the most expensive hubs in which to rent a home in the country after bearing the brunt of unprecedented interstate migration over the past three months. Vacancy rates have sunk as low as 0.2 per cent, and house rent prices have rocketed by up to $75 a week in key suburbs.
The figures, which come from Domain’s Rent Report for the March quarter, further reveal house rents rose at the steepest pace of annual growth in about 15 years, with Sunshine Coast house rents swelling by $80 over the past year to reach $580 a week, while house rents on the Gold Coast rose by $50 to reach $560 a week.
Over the same period, unit asking rents on the Gold Coast rose by $25 to $465 a week and on the Sunshine Coast by $40 to reach $460 weekly.
By comparison, the weekly house rents for Greater Sydney, Canberra and Brisbane are now $550 a week, $600 per week and $440 a week, respectively.
Property experts have placed the historic growth spurt on the mass exodus from Australia’s major capitals – fuelled by the ongoing pandemic and ignited by the shift towards remote working, with hot spots, such as Noosa and Surfers Paradise sitting directly in the eye of the rental storm.
Domain senior research analyst Nicola Powell said that as a result, tenants were facing extreme competition with both coastal cities far outstripping Brisbane in median asking rent prices amid record-low vacancy rates.
“The rents now on the Sunshine Coast and Gold Coast are comparable to the expensive parts of the ACT and Sydney … looking at the vacancy rates, it’s 0.3 per cent (on the Sunshine Coast) in Buderim, Noosa and Nambour and in Caloundra its 0.2 per cent,” Dr Powell said.
“This is extremely low, to the extent I would say there’s a rental crisis in some of these areas.
“What will be happening on the ground is that prospective tenants are offering more (than the asking prices) because it’s so hard to find vacant property.”
Ray White Surfers Paradise Group general manager Amber Roberts said tales of home hunters sleeping rough and homes being leased mere hours after they hit the web were now par for the course.
“At our peak time, we were getting 14,000 inquiries a month, and it’s normally around 5000 to 6000. It just doesn’t seem to be slowing down,” Ms Roberts said.
“And now we have people who have sold and don’t want to jump back into the housing market but don’t realise it’s a rental housing crisis … and these are our two biggest markets right now – those people and then interstate migration.”
It’s a potent mix that saw house rent prices in Gold Coast suburbs Broadbeach, Burleigh and Surfers Paradise all soar by 7.1 per cent over the past quarter to $750 per week, with tenants frequently paying more than the listed price.
It’s almost impossible to find a negatively geared property as an investor at the moment, agents say. Photo: Kollosche
“I’m getting $100 to 150 a week more than I would have got six months ago … and on a re-let, it’s 20 per cent to 30 per cent more,” Ms Roberts said.
“It’s heartbreaking. We’ve had people living in their cars and pitching a tent in someone’s backyard because they can’t get a property … everything in that mid-range of $600 to $700 per week they can’t even get a foot in the door.
“But it’s great for investors … it’s almost impossible to get a negatively geared property at the moment … this is absolutely the best time to invest.
“We’ve also had massive shifts in the prestige end of the market, and we’re getting $300 to $400 more per week (than the listed price) on some of those properties. That end of the market exploded because Sydney and Melbourne buyers saw more value compared to what they could get at home.”
The lure of lifestyle and sunshine drove Marianthi Kypuros to ditch “cold” Melbourne for the Gold Coast in January (to coincide with the school year for her son). But after spending months hunting for a place to live and even spending eight weeks in an overpriced Airbnb, the exasperated mum said she was still in housing limbo.
“We’d been thinking about it for years, and then [after COVID-19 struck] we thought it was now or never,” Ms Kypuros said.
“But then we just couldn’t find anything [to rent] unless you’re a multimillionaire. Anything for average people was pretty average … even when I was a student, I wouldn’t have stayed there – they [affordable options] were feral.
“People were even offering payments upfront and still not getting anything … it’s demoralising, and I’m not sure what’s going to happen; I’m just hoping things will settle down.”
While Ms Kypuros said the plan was ultimately to buy, she said rundown hovels in key neighbourhoods were selling for up to $2 million, forcing her to wait out the storm or, ultimately, return to Melbourne.
Further north on the Sunshine Coast, co-principal at McGrath Noosa, Kirsty Kernot, said even for units it was almost impossible to find a rental underneath $500 now with locals feeling the brunt of rental price hikes.
Local Noosa agents say units have also become rare as hens’ teeth and hotly contested. Photo: Patrick Oberem
“We have one rental that we’re starting inspections for today, and we had all the inspection slots booked out within 10 minutes of the listing going live,” Ms Kernot said.
“The other hard thing is every time I do lease renewals, the owners know what is going on in the market, so they want to put their prices up, and it’s a really hard situation to be in for the people who rent that property.
“They have a certain salary, so they’re either stuck with scrimping to try and pay it, or they have to move out.”
But while price hikes forced some local tenants out of their home, Ms Kernot said many owners were trying to help out long term tenants as they saw the value in a reliable local as opposed to a southern migrant only looking to lease for a year before buying.
Of those migrants, she said Sydney sea-changers were the major players in their market as part of a lifestyle trend that seemed to be gathering momentum.
“In a normal market, once we get over summer and into winter, it dies off massively … but we’ve been waiting for things to slow down, and they haven’t.
“And the next thing is when overseas borders open, and those expats come back – that will be the next wave,” Ms Kernot said.
Article Source: www.domain.com.au
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