The New Gold Coast - April 2024
April 17, 2024 / Written by Andrew Bell
By Andrew Bell OAM, Chairman | The Ray White Surfers Paradise Group
QLD Board Member | Real Estate Institute of Australia
The decision over a year ago to amalgamate the previous five Gold Coast City Council departments namely, Destination Gold Coast, Major Events Gold Coast, Study Gold Coast, and the Home of the Arts, into one super body called Destination Gold Coast, has been a huge success. The new authority is charged with the responsibility to build the Gold Coast as the lifestyle capital of Australia. This is quite transformational for the Gold Coast and it is already paying significant dividends.
Destination Gold Coast is not only supporting the local communities, whether that is a local school or sporting event, it is also driving significant City events and especially whole of City cultural events. This is shown in areas where we now have opera and ballet productions on the Gold Coast, concerts of all styles from P!nk to Paul McCartney, and of course adding to our already well-established Gold Coast Marathon and GC500, new major events such as the Pacific Airshow. It is helping transform the city from a great place to holiday which is what most people previously thought of the Gold Coast, through to what has now been described as the number one lifestyle centre of Australia.
Since the Gold Coast was discovered in the late 1800s it was always regarded as a very special part of Australia. Officially only one of five perfect climates of the world according to the United Nations and featuring over 40 kilometres of the most magnificent golden sand beaches. These always were the cornerstones of the Gold Coast but today it is so much more. We are in a post pandemic reassessment of life period, and people are far more focused on the quality of life where more liberal workplace practices allow people to base themselves on the Gold Coast no matter where their work is in Australia. In fact, the Gold Coast economy is now expanded well beyond tourism related strengths to being one of the major educational hubs in Australia, a thriving medical centre with amazing medical research and huge breakthroughs in cures have now come from the Gold Coast. A leader in all things Marine, the Gold Coast is also manufacturing buses and the list goes on which is far too long and too detailed.
The knock-on effect to the real estate market has been profound. The continuous migration of Australians from all corners of the country but especially Melbourne and Sydney, has seen unprecedented demand for our real estate. Although the Gold Coast is the sixth largest City in Australia, its land size is relatively small. As such the capacity to keep opening up new tracks of land for housing is almost non-existent. It certainly explains why the growth in apartment development has been the answer. It is also because the great majority of people migrating to the Gold Coast are high wealth interstate migrants who have sold their interstate homes for astronomical prices and are taking all that wealth to the Gold Coast. It has made it possible for significantly higher prices to be paid and indeed in leading suburbs such as Surfers Paradise and Broadbeach, 25% or more of sales each year are cash purchases. No mortgage stress for those property owners.
Surfers Paradise has just been named as the number one suburb in Queensland for the volume of apartment sales, as ever-increasing numbers of people are flocking to the central marketplaces of the Gold Coast, as people see these areas as a pivotal point of wonderful activities and the lifestyle that they are seeking.
Never in the history of the Gold Coast has the market been so strong and underpinned by incredible wealth. Everytime a high wealth person moves to the Gold Coast they inevitably trigger other family members or close friends to join them. As they come to visit their friends, they see the wonderful lifestyle that they are enjoying and it triggers yet another person to follow suit. This perpetual momentum of migration will continue to drive property values on the Gold Coast.
As the locals say, the Gold Coast may not be perfect but name a place anywhere in the world that is better.
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