Why Housing Keeps Getting More Expensive – Construction, Costs & Reality

In this episode of the Fraser Coast Property Brief, Glen sits down with Ian Langer from Master Builders Queensland to unpack why housing keeps getting more expensive and what is really happening behind the scenes in the construction industry.

The conversation breaks down the current strength of the Fraser Coast building market, where strong population growth continues to drive demand, while supply struggles to keep up. Ian explains how construction costs have shifted since COVID, with labour shortages, material price increases, and fuel costs all placing pressure on projects. He highlights how recent spikes in civil materials, freight, and supply chain delays are flowing directly into the final price buyers are paying.

You will also hear how subcontractor availability and reliability are impacting timelines, why fixed price contracts have become a major risk for builders, and how financial pressure across the industry is increasing the risk of insolvency. The episode covers the role of taxes, regulation, and planning delays, and how these factors add layers of cost before a home is even built.

A key insight from Ian focuses on the current petrol and fuel pressures, and how these costs are affecting everything from transport to materials, adding another layer of strain to an already stretched system.

This is a clear look at the realities facing builders, developers, and buyers right now, along with what needs to change to improve affordability and confidence in the market.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to the Fraser Coast Property Brief, the podcast where property, development and business leaders share what's really happening across the Fraser Coast. Each episode brings you insights into local projects, market trends, and the people helping shape the future of our region. Welcome to our latest episode of the Fraser Coast Property Brief. Today's topic is why housing keeps getting more expensive and what no one's talking about, especially in the construction side. My guest today is the regional manager of QMBA, Ian Langer. Welcome, Ian. Thanks, Glenn. Thanks for the invite. Yeah, so property brief, we're going to unpack some of the big issues right now in Australia. Housing affordability is a major issue. Why it's getting harder and harder to build, what people don't realise is happening in the housing industry, what's driving prices going up, you know, and our latest thing is the fuel crisis, obviously, in Iran. Structural costs in the system. You know, since COVID, you know, like pre-COVID days, we're probably about $1,200 a square meter of a house. We're probably $2,200, $2,300 a square meter now. Is that correct, Ian? Depends on the house, but yeah, that is sort of numbers being somewhere in a row. Want to talk about that in a bit more detail. There's so much tax regulation that it's a substantial layer of costs. So maybe just give us a little bit of uh background on your role, Ian, with the QMBA and what you actually do.

SPEAKER_00 1:29

Yeah, so Master Builders Queensland is an industry association. So we are what I call a broad church uh industry association. So we've got a combination of builders, trade contractors, manufacturer suppliers, uh professionals, basically everyone that brings the whole construction industry together. We represent that that group of um of I guess construction businesses. Um I always talk about two sides of the mountain. There's one side of the mountain where we do advocacy work, and we're working with um the various levels of government, uh particularly Queensland State government and more likely councils, um, just to try and help to guide their policy, uh give feedback on the changes they're making and where to where it could be, you know, efforts can be best directed, and just try and shape the industry regulation as best we can. Um the other side of the mountain, we're looking after those members. So in the White Bay, we've got close to 600 members, um Harvey Bay, Mirabara, Bunderburg, up to Agnes Waters, out to Monto. Um, and we're representing those members as they navigate the various compliance parts of the industry, particularly technical codes, um, consumer disputes, uh, health and safety questions, contractual issues, all that sort of stuff, and licensing as well. So anything QBCC. So we're sort of working both sides, just getting feedback from the members. Got some really strong committees here locally who give us feedback on what's required, and that goes back up to the back up to the state board, um, which gives us direction.

SPEAKER_01 3:02

So part of it's uh lobbying the state government for better regulations, the other side's training the industry to be more professional as well. So there are your two big main ones start with.

SPEAKER_00 3:12

Absolutely, trying to guide the the regulation in the right direction, but also once it's been decided, then the education side comes in, making sure that everyone's equipped to deal with those new rules.

SPEAKER_01 3:22

It's a constantly changing field. So let's just start off with a broad question around the market context. How how strong is the construction industry in the Fraser Coast at the moment?

SPEAKER_00 3:33

Yeah, it's really strong. It's about 10% of all employment um is in the construction industry. Uh, it's probably the same as a percentage as what it's always been. Hovey Bay has always been very construction focused, but the numbers have grown. Um we have got um uh trying to think, it's about um I've got numbers there for the actual number of businesses, but it's about 10% of the entire um Fraser Coast economy and businesses is that um employees thousands of people as well. Um, and it's about 1,500, 1,600 of those are actually businesses, business owners. So it's very strong, big part of that mix.

SPEAKER_01 4:11

So, you know, we've got a strong growth rate, we've got two and a half thousand people coming into the region. We probably need to build something around a thousand hundred types of dwellings, whether that's a retirement, house, apartment, whatever else, it's probably around that per annum. Are we keeping up with supply or are we constantly chasing at the moment?

SPEAKER_00 4:30

I think uh it's a national's problem, it's a state problem, and it's a local problem. So, demand for housing uh versus supply, we're not keeping up. That's that's the bottom line. There's there's more demand than there is uh supply. And that's one of the things triggering price growth.

SPEAKER_01 4:46

So, what's what's the thing that's stopping us keeping up? Is it land supply? Is it the actual number of trades in the construction industry, or is it, you know, or is there too much regulation that slows down the process? What's the above all of the above?

SPEAKER_00 5:02

You know, land has to be unlocked so we can build on it. Um there has to be enough qualified trade contractors, and Queensland has one of the most highly regulated building industries in Australia, if not the world, as far as who can actually work in the industry. Um there has to be enough trade qualified trade quant contractors coming through uh and builders. There has to be uh a good supply, robust supply chain, so materials are available when they should be. There needs to be a reasonable amount of regulation that's very much focused on getting houses built and not everything else. Um so all those things are holding back the capacity of the industry to to meet demand.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

Yeah. So let's jump into the costs, you know. Like we've both been in the industry for a very long time, you know. I started in construction here in 1981, so I've seen all the boons, busts, but I've never seen anything like COVID. Like we we were from 2008, it really went down, prices were flat, margins were very low. We sort of had a very steady, you know, 10 years, and COVID hit, all of a sudden we're $1,200 a square metre for a house to we're nearly, you know, $2,200 a square metre for a house, you know, in a few years. Like we were up 67% in costs. Um what happened, you know, besides the obvious income, what made it go up so much so quickly?

SPEAKER_00 6:32

You're right, no one saw it coming. Um and it's it's unprecedented. They use that word a lot during COVID. What made it go up? Um the supply chains got disrupted, was the first thing. So it became scarcity of materials. Where we were importing timber from America, and keep in mind a lot of developed countries did the same thing Australia did. Um they went straight to a a program of building and construction to keep employment going um and keep the economy rolling. So where we were getting excess timber from America, that dried up. Um, where we were getting, and we didn't realize the supply chain where it was all coming from. LVLs out of Ukraine. So the Ukraine, the Ukraine war happening at the same time actually made it worse as well. Um transport costs got heavy because all the wharfs got shut down. So there was a supply problem there as well. And all of a sudden, trade contractors got a bit rare and became in demand.

SPEAKER_01 7:33

So their prices went up too, yeah, supply and demand. So, you know, we've had this Iran crisis for the last few weeks. Um fuel price going up, people put an exercise on fuels, but now we're starting to see it in real construction items. You know, probably one of the first things I've seen is polypipes going up over 30% all of a sudden in the middle of April. Um what's this gonna do to construction prices right now with just this crisis? If it's you know, and does it depend on how long this crisis goes for?

SPEAKER_00 8:03

I think you can break things into two categories. So polypipes are really good example. A lot of the products that we use are made from petrol. So anything synthetic comes from petrol. So you've got your polypipes, probably gonna look at vinyl, flooring, and carpet will be the same. Um, anything that's got a vinyl texture to it, um, anything that requires petrol to be manufactured. So plastic plumbing fittings, electrical cable, electrical conduit will be in the same boat, um bath tubs, you know, be surprised how much of what goes into a house is synthetic. So those prices will rise quickly and more high than the things that just need to be transported. And things like concrete, when you follow the the trail back to how it all starts, starts in a quarry with things that use diesel, gets shipped to the concrete bashing plant with trucks that use diesel. Um, and then it's delivered by trucks to to the site. So concrete's gonna is already showing that there's gonna be some some extraordinary increases in that, which we also saw at the back end of COVID. Um concrete was one of the last ones to go up during COVID.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

Um we're seeing the fuel excites go up straight away, aren't we? Just with deliveries, concrete pumps and concrete deliveries.

SPEAKER_00 9:19

Yeah, yeah. And and you're also gonna see obviously timber's got to be shipped, iron's got to be shipped, so all all our roofing products, um, our framing products expect those prices to rise as well. But the heavier ones will be, we think, in the items that are requiring petrol for the manufacturer as well as transport.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

So crystal ball stuff, um, trying to get into Trump's mind of where the war's got to go.

SPEAKER_00 9:43

That's a crazy place to be.

SPEAKER_01 9:45

I I listened to some of our major builders that we talked to, they're talking anything up to $50,000 increase in house prices. Um I read Rawlinson's this morning, they just put a new document out this morning. They said if the war's short term, it could be up to 2.5% increase. But if this this war goes medium term, we're looking at a six to nine percent increase in construction pricing. What's the QMBA saying at the moment?

SPEAKER_00 10:11

Look, it's a really difficult scenario to look at because if I'm a builder, I'm I'm competing with other builders for those contracts, and that comes down the contractual line as well. And I don't want to be too dear because then everyone's gonna say, well, you're dearer than the other bloke. I'm not gonna go with you, and banks won't won't won't approve loans because it doesn't measure up. But if I come in too cheap, what we saw in COVID is so many of the builders were building homes and losing $15,000, $20,000, $50,000 on a house. Now those guys have seen this. We said before, no one saw COVID coming, but we now know what can happen with this. So what we're actually seeing is we're seeing a large number, and I'm talking like, you know, 30% plus, of builders that with our internal surveys that we're doing constantly with our members saying they're holding off and signing contracts.

SPEAKER_01 11:04

Yeah. Yeah, I've I've had a few builders up this week, some of the bigger, bigger chains, and they're really worried. Um, some are large enough that they're actually filling storehouses up with materials. They're buying, like they've got, you know, I was talking to one builder this morning, you've got 80 contracts, and they're bought warehouses worth of stuff now to fix the price. Yeah, they've got to carry it.

SPEAKER_00 11:26

And that's part of the advice we're giving is you know, use preliminary agreements up front to get all the council approvals and the engineering and soil testing and like done. Sign your contract as close as you can to when you're gonna start work and buy as much material as you can in advance.

SPEAKER_01 11:40

So I'll get into contracts in a bit of a minute because we've both got some issues for contracts over the years. Um, supply chains. Is there anything out there that's saying that certain materials are going to become a problem in the next couple of months? Is there a shortage of anything coming up that you can see?

SPEAKER_00 11:57

We were surprised to see in our survey results that members are already experiencing delays in product. We didn't see that coming with this. We thought that this would not affect that, but it has. And what we're also seeing is that manufacturers and suppliers are starting to try and uh substitute traditional products for new stuff and may or may not be approved. So that's something for everyone to look out for.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

So do you think it's in the finished products like your poly products, like you said, or is it in the materials like the bricks and the timber and things like that?

SPEAKER_00 12:27

Where do you see the I I think it'll be across the board because anything that comes from overseas is going to be it definitely I think it's gonna be at more at risk. Stuff that's manufactured locally, um, the supply chain isn't as complex and it's not as long. And to quote somebody from very early in this conflict, Australia is the very, very back end of all the supply chains. Um so if it's manufactured locally, it should be better, but depending on what it's relying on. Go back to COVID. There was millions of cars sitting in manufacturers' car lots because they couldn't get a chip. Yeah, the car was built bar one bit.

SPEAKER_01 13:03

Yep. We had a semi ship, I know, yep. But that you know, and and that's a reflection of you know Australian policy for the last 20 years. We've exported all the raw materials and we're paying for it brought back finished, and we've we've been caught with our pants down.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

And we said during COVID we would learn from this, we didn't.

SPEAKER_01 13:19

No, we uh the government come out in about 2020 and said we need 90 plus days fuel supply, everything like that, and we're down to 30. Um crazy. Anyway, fixed price contracts, it's it's a bone of contention for the building industry and has been for many years. There's so much regulation about consumer protection in fixed price contracts, but it's nothing to protect the builder when they go into fixed price contact with mum and dad, then all of a sudden all their materials and their labour goes up afterwards and they're wearing the $50,000 loss. Where's the QMBA sit with this? And how do we change or help this regulation, you know, with rise and fall or something in there to protect both sides?

SPEAKER_00 14:02

It is the most asked question I've had in the last two or three weeks. Yep. Um, there's been some pretty robust debate about that at our local committee levels as well. Why is nothing being changed, why is nothing being done. And look, I think you've got to look at it pragmatically and say there's a lot of law that circles around a building contract. Yeah. There's the QBCC Act, which is specific to Queensland, there is the ACCC Act, there is the Fair Trading Act, there is 300 years of common law to deal with contracts that haven't changed. If you did legal studies 30 years ago, I can guarantee you're looking at the same example cases that you would be doing now. Right? So there's a lot of law wrapped around this stuff, and contracts are always designed to create certainty for all the parties. Normal fixed price contracts have got elements in there that are variable anyway. So there's prime costs, there's provisional sums, they're variable. So there is some variation in there. And through COVID, what we saw was the industry moved to the point where you couldn't get a price on a frame. You went to order a frame and trust, and the plants would say, Yeah, 12 months we can't tell you what it's going to cost. That's a legitimate provisional sum.

SPEAKER_01 15:14

So just for the non-building people out there, it's prime cost and it's provisional sums. What do those two things mean?

SPEAKER_00 15:22

So prime cost is probably the best way to describe it is selections. So prime costs are things that you put an allowance in the contract for, like a kitchen, tiles, windows, glazing, doors, uh floor covering, um, all those sort of items that they want to make that when you go to contract, the consumer hasn't 100% decided what they want yet.

SPEAKER_01 15:42

Yeah, so it's an item that not including labour and things like that.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

It can be hot water systems, electrical fittings.

SPEAKER_01 15:48

So, what's the provisional sum then?

SPEAKER_00 15:50

Provisional sums is something that's in the contract where there's an allowance for something that may occur that you can't really predict. So, common one for a building contract might be earthworks. Right. You can do all of your soil testing and it still comes up that there's a uh there's a rock there that's gonna take a lot of earth moving to get rid of. There might be some pipes that aren't on the map that weren't discovered. There could be anything. If you go to some places, it could be a mine shaft. Yeah. You know, so a lot of what we build on is old farms and farmers bury everything. So um so provisional sums, also if you're doing renovations, it could be when you can't really do an invasive um discovery of what's behind walls until you start your work and you pull a wall down and you find it's um particularly bathrooms, asbestos, um, mould, rot, all those things.

SPEAKER_01 16:39

So, what's your advice at the moment for the consumer and the builder if they're about to enter into a building contract now with this uncertainty out there? How how do both parties tread cautiously and both parties reasonable protected?

SPEAKER_00 16:56

I think they've got to look at this as being a partnership. Like the worst case scenario for everybody is to get to a point where you're three-quarters of the way through the build and your builder just can't fund it. Yeah. Because the prices have got out of control. Now, in a perfect world, everyone's got all the money in the world and they can fund every project they do. And there's definitely very strict regulations in Queensland about the building industry, all licensees, not just builders, having sufficient funds to fund their projects. But when costs blow out, extra like extraordinary as they're doing now, that may get stretched. So the last thing anybody wants is to actually go to contract, hold someone to the contract like without any negotiation at all, and then find out that has resulted in the build sitting there for six months unfinished while the QBCC sorts it out.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

So does that mean using the same contracts, or is it different contract, or is it a plus-plus contract, or is it uh or is there more provisional sums or something in there to protect everybody?

SPEAKER_00 18:03

So so as we went through the COVID cycle, things like frames and trusses became legitimate provisional sums because you couldn't get a price on them.

SPEAKER_01 18:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:12

Roofing line was going up so quickly that you couldn't get a price on it, um, because the time frames were blowing out as well. So the longer you have to wait for anything as a supply, the more it's going to cost when you get there. So they weren't able to get actual accurate pricing, which means they become a legitimate provisional sum. Alright.

SPEAKER_01 18:30

So buy a beware and build a beware at the moment.

SPEAKER_00 18:33

Yeah, I think so.

SPEAKER_01 18:34

Let's just talk about the other hidden things in the building industry: tax regulation costs. Um, you know, say if you're paying $2,000, you know, for a $200 square, so you have four to five hundred thousand dollars for your average house build at the moment. Um how much of that is regulation tax cost compared to what's physical going into the building?

SPEAKER_00 19:00

Well, you know, uh from our perspective, we know that there's a lot of tax from all three levels of government in the house. And you've seen the figures.

SPEAKER_01 19:09

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 19:09

Okay, so you know what they are. We know that that's there. Do we believe that there's any capacity for us to negotiate that out? I I think governments are going to be very reluctant to give that up.

SPEAKER_01 19:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:21

Okay. So what we focus on is we focus on the regulatory stuff that we can get the price down with. So getting rid of red tape. Uh, a classic example is um the new NCC codes that came out in 2022. They force every single buyer of a new home to have a seven-star house and all seven-star um for um sustainability, and also um accessibility for someone who may need wheelchair access and stuff like that. So we know there's a need for that for some of that housing in the market, and I see it when we go around and judge our awards program. There's people who buy it, build their forever homes, they'll be staying in them till they go to retirement homes and they've got capacity to have that stuff in it built into it. But not everybody needs it.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:09

Not everybody. So there's about 40 to 50 grand right there that people are paying. They don't need to pay.

SPEAKER_01 20:15

We've got an affordability crisis out there and 40 to 50 grand. We're gold plating everything rather than giving options within the market.

SPEAKER_00 20:22

Yeah, exactly. And also built into um, and this will come back to well, I'll save it for later on, but there's a lot of there's a lot of um social um agenda built into the posture building as well. Yeah. That doesn't need to be there. Yep, changes with politics. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:40

So current trends as far as legislation, is there anything new coming into the industry over the next 12 months? You know, it's there any new workplace health and safety, is there any new building codes or is there anything going to change our building environment that you can see the next 12 months as an industry body?

SPEAKER_00 20:59

Yeah, look, there's always change. The the building codes have gone through a pretty significant amount of change over the last, like for 2022. The 2025 codes are more focused on commercial. Um we are still lobbying, it's one of our key agenda points is to get that sustainability and the accessibility is options. So if people want it, they can have it and make sure it's an adequate stock in the market for those people that need it, but not everybody. So we get that price out. It's one of our key agendas. So we're hoping we can get that down and get those become optional rather than compulsory. Um health and safety, we've worked really hard to get rid of some of the duplication. So up until recently, if you had a health and safety incident, you had to report it to both Health and Safety Queensland and to the QBCC. So we've got rid of that. So they're actually now talking. So there's um health and safety has become a lot more active in this area. Yep. And we're seeing that it's adding, you know, obviously complexity to to to to projects as well. Health and safety is really important. We need to work safely, but some of the stuff that they're asking us to do is just prohibitive with cost.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

Yeah. Yeah. I know like I've seen it in the market even like when they changed sort of the health and safety with two-story houses with all the you know the roofing scaffolding. You don't see many two-story houses. You know we're trying to get smaller blocks and make them more efficient.

SPEAKER_00 22:23

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 22:23

But we've we've done something in the building w which knocked out probably 90% of our two story houses in our region.

SPEAKER_00 22:30

Yeah exactly. So as the block sizes are getting smaller you're 100% right we need to get more out of each piece of land which means going up.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

Yeah and it and to do a two story single story you know some of the figures I'm seeing it's probably $400 a square meter more or even higher than that. So it just you know the land's not that expensive where you you need to do that.

SPEAKER_00 22:52

So it's getting there.

SPEAKER_01 22:53

Yeah it's it is getting there. So talking about that where where do you see the future trend just focusing on the Fraser Coast in the in the short to medium term you know I'm seeing a change in the housing because I'm seeing the change in the in the blocks so we see it 12 months 18 months in advance block sizes are coming down to 400 square meters.

SPEAKER_00 23:12

Council's putting a gentle density type overlay into town planning scheme where they're looking for terraces, duplexes, zero alignments all those things in the building side do you see your builders changing what they're actually building away from that four-story media room 220 square metre house is is there a directional change yet not really no no so what so what we're seeing obviously you know we've had some developments the last probably five or so years that's been that smaller block type stuff Springs is a good example but it's still getting nice size homes on those those blocks. We've got our awards program at the moment so all the entries are pretty much in for that and there's almost no medium density in there. So Harvey Bay is a really interesting environment for construction change because most of the people who've moved here have moved here to be close to the water. They've got boats they've got caravans they want that extra land but we're also seeing with that migration coming out of Melbourne and Sydney that you spoke about last week they're used to living in units. So you would know yourself Harvey Base had a history of struggling to sell units.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

But it's and it and it belies what's actually happening because we've got an average age of 51 we've only got we've only got 2.1 people per household here and so that means we should be doing a lot of medium density but only 12% of our stock in our market is medium density. State average is about uh 24% and I think Brisbane's around 26%. So we are less than half of regional Queensland on medium density it's it's a strange phenomenon that's very unique to the Fraser coast.

SPEAKER_00 24:56

Well it's actually all of Wide Bay Bundab's exactly the same so and it comes back to the people that I've met in my role that have walked in our office and said and I'm talking about tradies and builders from other states and said I'm on holidays what's it like to live here what's it like to work here and they've all moved here because they can put a boat in the water really easily. But you're right the population density is changing the people that are moving here that have cashed up from places like Melbourne and Sydney and all they've come from the Sunshine Coast because they've sold their property to them some of those people will be much more happier in a unit. Yeah place to amend these yeah and and cost will eventually stack it up I think the middle ground that we're seeing a lot of here is the over 55 villages. As you say aging population the low the the low maintenance type situations a bit of a community like an apartment block shared facilities but it's still a house.

SPEAKER_01 25:52

But we've got about I think it's about 3,600 either under construction approved or whatever going on. But the risk I see is we need 25 to 40 year olds up here we need nurses and we need other people we're not making any accommodation for the younger generation. We're catering for the retirees but we're doing nothing to change to cater for those 25 year olds that want a lifestyle. They don't want to mow the lawns on the weekend they want a life.

SPEAKER_00 26:19

Yeah so so as I said Harvey Bay's struggled with that for a long time I believe and I think things were changing um but when you ask me what I'm seeing most of the builders that I deal with are still building houses.

SPEAKER_01 26:31

Yeah so we'll wrap it up in a sec but just give me some takeaways out of this you know you know you know it's construction prices going to keep going up supply chains under pressure do you see any significant change in the market over the next six or twelve months or is this a bit of a a blimp we're going to get past and keep moving forward?

SPEAKER_00 26:53

I want to be full of good news and I don't want to put a you know a negative on the industry in any way that's not what I'm here for. But I think to be realistic if we look at COVID and what happened there construction costs went up by about 50% over that whole period and the circumstances that actually created those cost increases have gone away but they didn't cost increases have not.

SPEAKER_01 27:16

Yep so they didn't go back down.

SPEAKER_00 27:17

Yeah so everybody that got that higher price continue to get the higher price. Now I'm not going to get into the rights and wrongs of that but we've got a situation at the moment where it's not even started let alone finished over there. Once and again I'm not a political commentator but the big question's going to be who controls Australia Famous if it's going to be the number one. We realise there's a problem there now. Who's going to control it? The infrastructure that's been destroyed already will take years to rebuild. This is not going to go away quickly and I think we need to adjust as an industry. And the things we can do I'm seeing already building companies doing four day weeks straight away 20% of that fuel cost is gone because you're not going to site on the fifth day.

SPEAKER_01 28:05

It's been slower to get your house built.

SPEAKER_00 28:07

A little bit yeah but no to do in 10 hour days.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

10 hour days 40 days said take your roof racks off your car and that will save fuel yeah you're you know one of the stupidest things I've seen in ad for a long time.

SPEAKER_00 28:21

Yeah it is it is but if if fuel is the thing that's actually causing the price rise yeah we can manage that to a degree.

SPEAKER_01 28:28

Yeah. But we have to do things slightly differently all right um any tips or any last comments about the construction industry in Fraser Coast?

SPEAKER_00 28:37

Look it's a great place to be and I it we have been in in the Fraser case in the Wide Bay we have been at the forefront of building growth through the whole COVID period people discovered the lifestyle here and they realize they can do their jobs in Sydney from Harvey Bay and it's created this massive growth of I was talking about trades before there's like 1300 more tradees and builders in Harvey Bay than there was before pre-COVID. They've moved here because it's a good opportunity. But we're going to have those challenges and we've also always been a little bit behind the capital cities and the value of our properties which is why people can move here and be better off. I think that's going to continue.

SPEAKER_01 29:21

Yeah like all the forward forecasts with population growth things like it's not going to change here for a you know a decade so we might get a bit of a a bump over the next few months but the long term forecasts are still really strong.

SPEAKER_00 29:33

Yeah yeah well prices will adjust people have to adjust how to do things have to find out ways to be more innovative but the reality is if you look at the whole of Australia this region still has all the good things going for it.

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Yeah it certainly does so Ian I really appreciate your time today and your insight into industry so thank you everybody for listening and don't forget to follow us on Spotify or YouTube and stay tuned every week we've got to have something on the property industry around the Fraser Coast. So thanks again.

SPEAKER_00 30:00

Thanks Glenn appreciate being here