Brisbane to be the next investor hotspot
Brisbane will be the next investment hotspot despite currently flying under the radar, according to a property industry expert.
Having not performed particularly strongly over the last 10 years, Positive Real Estate’s CEO Sam Saggers told Smart Property Investment that he expects we’ll see a flurry of investment activity in the area soon.
Unfortunately, he explained, “There’s a big misconception of what Brisbane is”. This is particularly evident in the data, which often includes areas such as Ipswich and Logan, parts of greater Brisbane. This has caused many investors to turn away from the area.
“The only reason investors haven’t caught on is that by including Ipswich, Logan and [the other areas], we’re actually deflating [the statistics that show] a marketplace on the move,” he said. He explained that having caught up with RP Data's Tim Lawless, there are plans for statistics to be released that separate out these areas more specifically.
“If we look at those marketplaces and add them to the statistics, they’ve had high delinquency rates, they’re under mortgage stress and quite often there’s a huge amount of land in those areas and so they pull the overall statistics down in what is happening in Brisbane LGA,” Mr Saggers continued. There are 1.4 million people within the LGA itself, and sentiment is expected to shift towards the area.
This may be based on its relative affordability. “It’s some 36 per cent cheaper based on the geography to Sydney, 16 per cent cheaper than Melbourne and even cheaper than Darwin, where there’s 100,000 people,” he said.
He noted that Brisbane LGA is set to be the next spot for investor activity, but warned away from greater Brisbane areas that have the potential for the government to release land plots to keep prices affordable.