Fraser Coast Property Brief
Fraser Coast Property Brief is a weekly podcast exploring property, development, investment and business across the Fraser Coast. Hosted by local industry professionals, the show features conversations with developers, agents, investors and decision-makers shaping the regionโs future, with insights into market trends, projects and opportunities.
Fraser Coast Property Brief
๐ช๐ต๐ฎ๐ ๐๐ฎ๐ฝ๐ฝ๐ฒ๐ป๐ ๐ช๐ต๐ฒ๐ป ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฃ๐ฟ๐ผ๐ฝ๐ฒ๐ฟ๐๐ ๐ ๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ธ๐ฒ๐ ๐๐ฒ๐๐ฒ๐น๐ ๐ข๐๐? | Kim Carter
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Whatโs really happening in the Fraser Coast property market โ and what could the next 12 months look like?
In this episode of The Fraser Coast Property Brief, Glen sits down with Kim Carter from Carter Cooper Realty for an honest and wide-ranging conversation about the changing real estate landscape.
They unpack rising listings, shifting buyer and seller expectations, market momentum, rental pressures and what a correction could mean for the Fraser Coast. Kim also shares his thoughts on why more agents may leave the industry as conditions become tougher, and what it takes to succeed when the market is no longer doing all the work for you.
The conversation also explores:
- Why buyers now have more choice and time to make decisions
- Why sellers may need to adjust their expectations
- The impact of interest rates and migration on the market
- Changing rental vacancy rates and investor activity
- Whether a market correction is necessarily a bad thing
- The importance of resilience, communication and hard work in real estate
- Kimโs outlook for the Fraser Coast over the next 12 months
- Why the region may be more protected than larger capital-city markets
With plenty of practical insights and honest opinions, this episode looks beyond the headlines to explore where the Fraser Coast property market may be heading next.
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 back to Fraser Coast Property Brief. Today I have Kim Carter from Carter Cooper Realty back again. Welcome, Kim. Thank you, Dan. So as one of the region's uh leading sales agents, more than 20 years' experience, the Harvey Bay markets has changed pace. Buyers have more choice, uh, sales volumes are starting to ease, rentals are more available, but property values are still higher than a year ago. Rather than simply reading the numbers, I want to talk to you about what's actually happening on the ground, um, buyers and how the buyers and sellers are feeling and what it takes to succeed in this market. And it's no longer driven by easy momentum anymore. So I might ask um before we get into the figures and to the actual crunching, um, describe how you feel the hubby market is now in a couple of sentences.
SPEAKER_00Um, I would say that the hubby market is probably leveled out at the moment um with buyers and with sellers. Like some sellers' expectations are still higher than what the market's registering, but at the end of the day, I think um it's like the market's taking a breather. Like we've had we've had so much momentum over the last few years. It's taking a breath at the moment, and um it'll be interesting to see what happens with the interest rates.
SPEAKER_01Yep. It's likely to go up again later in the year. So the market has slowed, but has it weakened? Um, you know, on a day-to-day business, do you feel it's weakening or just slowed?
SPEAKER_00No, it's just slowed. Like we're still doing sales and we're still getting good prices for properties, but it's a lot harder to get them done. Like you've got a the buyers are taking their time and the sellers are still got their expectations. So, you know, you need to talk to both of them. It's about communication and it's about working your buyer and seller.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Looking at statistics, we've still grown 9.7% over the last 12 months, uh, but the quarterly's only um grown about 0.4%. So it's it's a slowing effect, but a regional markets are doing better than capital cities because they're the ones going backwards at the moment.
SPEAKER_00That's right.
SPEAKER_01Yep. So I believe there's about 555 properties listed for sale around here. So that's up about 24% from a year ago. Um, is that giving the buyers more choice? Um, what's it doing to the market at the moment?
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. It's giving the buyers more choice, and it's also giving the buyers time to think, is this the property they want? Because they they're now looking at eight or nine properties, whereas before they only had two or three to look at. They're looking at eight or nine, they're getting themselves confused, and then they're thinking, well, we don't really know which property we want. So and we're also seeing a lot of buyers coming up here wanting to buy and wanting to put a contract on, but they they have to sell. So you haven't got them on the market yet.
SPEAKER_01So more inspections happening, you know, are they going to three or four or more houses rather than just trying to grab the first one they look at?
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And they're not running through houses. Like we have people running through houses and trying to put in an offer before they've got to the end of the house, but now that's all changed.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So it's probably a better paced market in reality.
SPEAKER_00It is. It is. I feel like after three to four years I've got control back of the market again.
SPEAKER_01Like we haven't had control for the last three to four years. It has been a frenzy since COVID. That's right. So so what's happened now with the sellers' prices? So last year, you know, market evidence were, you know, we were strong, we were going fast, but you know, and prices or houses were selling that were overpriced. What's happening on the seller side of the market at the moment? Are prices dipping, slowing, or people negotiating?
SPEAKER_00There's a lot more negotiating happening with contracts. Um sellers are wanting to still list high, think hoping that we'll still get that buyer. Yeah. Um, but you do see a lot of price adjustments coming through within a couple of weeks.
SPEAKER_01The stats are actually saying people discounting about 2.7% on average, but are they probably discounting more in reality?
SPEAKER_00You know, is it probably, yeah. Yeah. And it's the longer that it sits on the market, like I was saying to someone the other day, we don't want to chase the market down. Yeah. So if we price it right now with where the market's at now, we won't be chasing it down.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So how are the sellers dealing with real feedback about the reality of the market?
SPEAKER_00Well, the media helps because the media every time you turn the TV on, it's where the prices are dropping, the prices are dropping. So sellers are aware of it, but you just need to tell them, um, I think you need to reiterate what's actually happening.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so yeah, the the um media's trying to scare the hell out of the market at the moment. So is that affecting your influx of people coming from down south because their markets are actually gone down a little bit over last year. So has it slowed the migration of external buyers into our market?
SPEAKER_00It has slowed, but it's all the but when the w pe people do come, they're coming here saying we've got a hundred thousand or two hundred thousand less than what we expected. Right. So their budget changes as well. But then they they try to get those the houses here for the same reduction.
SPEAKER_01But are they coming from a capital city market where it's over a million? And then what are they looking for in this market?
SPEAKER_00Is it Um The Houses we're we're still selling houses across the board. Um obviously once you get over that 1.2, the buyers seem to slow a little bit, but we got a contract for over that today. So they're still coming in, um, but they're just taking that bit more work. I had a conversation this morning with a vendor, they bought a house, a unit, sorry, in Melbourne thirteen years ago, sold it for five hundred and sixty thousand. They looked at it online yesterday and it's on the market for four hundred eighty thirteen years later.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I think that's got a little bit to do with the Melbourne government at the moment.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um so looking at the market uh, you know, our local market, so forty-two per cent of our market is selling between six hundred and eight hundred thousand dollars, and twenty-seven per cent of our market selling between eight hundred and million dollars. Is that you seeing those proportions of what you're selling or Yeah, there's we don't have any stock under 700.
SPEAKER_00Right. So the six hundred price broker's probably now seven hundred. That's right. Um seven hundred to eight hundred is that's quite we did have a lot of investors, but obviously the investors aren't there. But there's a lot we seem to have a lot of families looking at the 700 to 900 now.
SPEAKER_01So the investors are gone since the budget and the government says no capital gains tax on established houses. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00We had the run of the super funds up until the 10th of August. And now they've all just falled up. And I'm actually talking to buyers agents and saying, you know, what what would you look what are you looking for here? What what do you want? Yeah. And they just said they just want brand new.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_00And they want brand new with a yield. That's what they're looking at across Australia.
SPEAKER_01Yep, it's gotta change the market over the next twelve months. Lucky I'm selling only new stuff. Um, I know. Well that's hard because the yields are down to four, four and a half percent or something like that around here at the moment. So the the yields aren't great because we'll get to that in a minute, but even the rental market softened a bit. So um so we've got an overall market, but it is there pockets within the Harvey Bay market that are doing better than others? Is there suburbs or a or a type of house or a price range that's outperforming the others?
SPEAKER_00No, I was looking at our sales for last month, and probably units haven't been um selling as fast and as much as what we were previously. Like we had a real run on units for a couple of years.
SPEAKER_01Is that lack of stock or just people turning back towards houses?
SPEAKER_00No, uh people are coming turning towards houses because they're coming back saying the body corporates they're too high. Too high. Compared and they're comparing it with the Sunshine Coast and Gold Coast and saying that uh ours across the board here are quite high with our rates as well.
SPEAKER_01What's the hot suburbs at the moment within the Harvey Bay region? Nick and Bar. Nick and Bar. In the Springs area and those new in Newark type suburbs. Yes. Yep. Um because they're they're probably averaging over a million dollars now, aren't they?
SPEAKER_00They are.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so it's not about price point, it's about where people want to live as well. Are they what's the family demographic there? There wouldn't be first home buyers, so who's the people moving into those sort of houses?
SPEAKER_00There's a lot of um well, I mean, they're your professionals. So there's doctors, influence offices, things like that. Um we get a lot of those. You've got solicitors living up there as well. So they're professional people moving to the area. Um and they've got kids, so they've got the school close by.
SPEAKER_01And they like the bigger blocks. That's correct. Yep. All right. Um rental conditions. So, you know, we've gone through over the last couple of years. We we had vacancy rates under one per cent, and I think Maribor was 0.9% for a while. Um, latest vacancy rates have just come out over the last couple of weeks. We had a 2.8% vacancy rate in rentals. So what are you seeing from your property management side of your business? Is it is there a lot more choice or is the inquiry slowed, or what what's going on in there to jump that so much?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so inquiry slowed, but you've also got a lot more properties there. And we're also noticing with the laws, with what tenants can do, they they don't have to wait for the end of their lease now. So they're seeing another house that they rent. They might have rented a house last year for 780 a week. Yeah. They're now seeing that same house for 680 a week. So they're just jumping and going back to that house. So it's leaving the high-end homes.
SPEAKER_01So explain that change in law, what's actually happening, because they used to go into a six-month lease or something like that. That's right.
SPEAKER_00So they're everybody's signing a lease now, but effectively there's ways that they can come back and go, well, you know, they it's pro-rata, but it's like four weeks effectively rent they need to pay and they can move on to somewhere else.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. No.
SPEAKER_00So, you know, there's there's a loan. No. Well, it makes you wonder what a bank's gonna say about leases. What are what's a lease?
SPEAKER_01Well, that's right, because if somebody's got a loan to buy an investment property and their and their rental guarantee is not guaranteed anymore, it's gonna put more pressure on the mum and dad investors are being affected.
SPEAKER_00So it's not enticing them to want to rent to want to buy an investment home.
SPEAKER_01No. So statistics are saying uh medium rentals six hundred and twenty-four dollars a week. What I've seen over the last year has been a lot higher than that.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01Is it pulling back at all or where where are you seeing it sitting?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so there's a lot of four-bedroom double lock up. Um we were seeing that go to like seven hundred fifty to eight hundred a week. They're probably pulled back to, you know, between six fifty and seven fifty now. And a lot is between six fifty and seven.
SPEAKER_01Yep, and again, they've got a choice, so they're not rushing into the first one they they look through. We used to be a lineup um a couple of years ago.
SPEAKER_00Correct.
SPEAKER_01So the uh so what's the rental market, the softening rental market, what's that actually doing to the property market? Isn't an early warning that demand is decreasing in the in the sales side because the vacancies are starting to increase? What's this telling us?
SPEAKER_00Well, I think initially, but in the long term, there's a lot of investors that are selling because of what's happened with capital gains tax and things like that. So we have a housing crisis, but I think we're gonna have a bigger housing crisis once they all sell within the next twelve months.
SPEAKER_01Yep. So the investors selling, are they selling their houses to owner occupiers? So yeah, creating less in so we've got to have less in the rental market again. So we could have a squeeze again within you know twelve months or so if the investment market doesn't read it up and the government's just making it very hard for people wanting to go into the investment market. That's right.
SPEAKER_00That's right.
SPEAKER_01So you know, like I you know, I've been doing this for over twenty years or thirty odd years, and you've been doing it for a long time, so I'm not gonna give you away your age here. So um we you know, we see the market grow with agents, and we see the market shrink all the time. And, you know, I've seen it dramatically grow over the last few years. Like every man he's dogs wants to be a real estate salesperson.
SPEAKER_00Um what does the average real estate agent in Australia how many houses does the average real estate agent in Australia sell a year?
SPEAKER_01I actually don't know. What is it? Probably a dozen. One. One. Is it? There's just so many listed people.
SPEAKER_00If you take all the listed real estate agents across Australia and average out the sales, it's one. So there's some people that aren't like I've talked to people on the Sunshine Coast where a lot of those guys have got second jobs now because they're finding it hard, you know, to make ends meet.
SPEAKER_01So Yeah, I'm seeing you know, we're seeing it over and over again, the shuffling of the deck chairs, um, people are moving around, people are jumping out of the game, or people are trying to do real estate two or three days a week. Do you think we're gonna see more of that over the next 12 months? Do you think as this market softens a little bit or evens out, is it gonna push the you know, the part-timers and the ones that are not really serious about the career out of real estate?
SPEAKER_00Unfortunately, I think it will. Yes, because like you know, it was only there's there's a there's still a lot of houses out there and there's still a lot to be done, but unfortunately I think and you're gonna see a lot of the young ones too, which we would love to see them succeed. So, you know, I'm wanting to put on trainees just to get them through and nurture them through.
SPEAKER_01And it's harder with the law suit, you know, but like the older days you used to get real estate agents on commission only, you can put them on and they can go. But now, if they haven't produced more than 125% of a of a net wage, you have to put them on a 12-month um, you know, retainer type situation. So the actual principals are also gotta be a bit wiser and a bit tighter over the next 12 months, too. They've got to say, well, I can't carry four or five guys who are not producing the minimum.
SPEAKER_00And that's right. And that's if you're paying rent on your premises and things like that. You know, a lot of people are renting their premises. So Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So, you know, like to me, I reckon you've got to be selling at least ten million dollars worth of real estate if you can start breaking even for a for an office.
SPEAKER_00Um so I think I think it's around about twelve million.
SPEAKER_01Is it twelve yeah, yeah. So yeah, and that's and like you said, there's so many people just selling one or if they're selling twelve, you know, that's not even not it that's probably seven or eight million dollars. So Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I think the people doing it part-time, they'll be the ones that don't continue with it.
SPEAKER_01But I don't think it's a bad thing though.
SPEAKER_00You know, like I Oh no, we all need a correction in every industry.
SPEAKER_01You know, but and we also need, you know, the ones that are going to stick at it long term to actually need to go through the peaks and troughs because order taking's easy, but I've been through some very lean years post-GFC, everything like that, and they're the ones that stick. And there's not too many agents that I can still name around here that were around in the GFC. You're one of them, but uh there's not too many I can name the rest of the game.
SPEAKER_00And I mean they were they were that was unknown times too, really. I remember when COVID started, we didn't know what was going to happen, but it went the opposite.
SPEAKER_01Yep. So is this a return to the old fashioned agency work? You know, during COVID, industry became we we honestly became order takers. There's so many, you know, we we just couldn't keep up. You know, the hardest thing was getting enough listings to sell, not not having it's not the buyers a problem, but That's right, listings are does genuine real estate work look like it did again, you know, pre-COVID? Is it are we heading back towards that era?
SPEAKER_00We're heading back towards that era, but we've also had so much come in since COVID, like we've now got the seller's disclosure statements, you've now got AML, like there's so much more paperwork and so much more responsibility not only on the principal, but on the salespeople themselves. Like there's a lot more that they have to go detail and you need to be up with everything to know to protect your client.
SPEAKER_01What does it really take for an agent to actually, you know, get its feet under the desk and actually be successful? Is it is it two or three years, you know.
SPEAKER_00No, and I always say to my guys that start, it's like an apprenticeship. You don't do an apprenticeship overnight and you're successful, it'll take two I would say eighteen months at least.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_00And then you you're secure and you go from there.
SPEAKER_01Because sometimes you're talking to somebody and they may come back six or twelve months later when they're ready to buy or they sold their previous house or something like that. So it's not an automatic thing. So so what's your secret to lasting success, you know? If you put it down to a special recipe, what what's made you last for a very long time in this industry? What's the what's the key points that you do?
SPEAKER_00I think the the number one is that I still enjoy what I do. Yep. And I still enjoy selling houses. Um and number two is the team that we've got around us. Like you know, they're like a family. Uh if you've got a good team around you and you've got and people working, like whether it be rentals, sales, whatever, um, and that that'll just push you through. But you do have to have the drive to want to do it too.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, more about resilience.
SPEAKER_00You need shoulder pads.
SPEAKER_01They are. It's some tough days.
SPEAKER_00It's brutal. It's brutal. And there's like, you know, you you hold it together for your staff, you hold it together for everyone, but some days can be really Yeah.
SPEAKER_01It's brutal inside and out.
SPEAKER_00You know, running the business is brutal enough as itself, but then dealing with a whole market and but not only that, we've got sellers that are stressed needing a sale.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You're trying to do that as well as run a business too. And, you know, it's just a matter of navigating everything. I I say to people looking at real estate, if you want to do real estate, you've got to be able to pivot and you've got to be able to change your plans at any time. If you're a person that does everything at on the hour, it's not the job for you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And you know, I know a lot of the more modern ones just purely use systems and think the system's gotta work. But yeah, how much contributes to just damn right hard work?
SPEAKER_00Oh, it's it is.
SPEAKER_01You know, because I still talk to you at six o'clock at night or something like that, and you're s you know you're always at work.
SPEAKER_00So and it is, it's it's dedication to what you're doing, but I don't want to go home. I mean, the biggest thing I hear is that people don't ring people back. They don't acknowledge people, so I don't want to go home and not ring ring people back. I've got to sleep on that. So I'd rather ring them back, deal with it, and then start tomorrow fresh.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and uh that's an office often complaint when you pick up a buyer from somewhere else. They said, Oh, I tried two or three people and never got a phone call bag. And that's and it's the easiest way to pick up a new deal is just communicating to people.
SPEAKER_00Communication's a key.
SPEAKER_01Alright. To close it out, w where do you see the market over the next twelve months? You know, are you cautious about it? Are you confident it's gonna come back? Are you gonna see any changes in our market? What's your outlook?
SPEAKER_00Well, I'm I'm probably all three of them. I'm cautious because w I don't think anyone knows which way it's going to go. Um, hoping that with the changes in the laws that investors all don't try and dump at one time, because if they all try and get out at the same time, that's gonna push push prices down.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So well, hopefully we won't see that. But Harvey Bay's still got demand, we've still got people ringing up. They want to move to Harvey Bay. So I think they it's often said that we're in a bubble. I want to stay in that bubble and get keep the sales going. And if we can keep the prices up without having to change it, well that's gonna be even better for everybody.
SPEAKER_01I think that's our saving grace. We we've still got you know, we've got 120 odd thousand people here now to Fraser Coast. We've still got about a two and a half percent growth, so we've I think we've got two thousand seven or two thousand eight hundred. So we've got to produce a thousand twelve hundred housing products per annum just to keep up demand. And we're not doing that. You know, new subdivisions are slow and they're just they're one or two years behind, and the bureaucracy of getting new product on is uh is killing people. So um so how's land sales? Uh I'm probably twelve months, two years out from having stock that is titled. So we've sold everything that we've got or and we've sold stuff into 2028 at the moment. So the problem's not the buyers, the problem's is just no titled land on. And that's gonna have problems for the builders and it's gonna have problems with the you know, investors wanting to get new house land packages because there's just not enough of it out there. So what's the signals you're looking for at the most? What's the worrying signals out there? Is it the inflation, is it the interest rates? What's what should people be looking out for as an indicator whether it's gonna go good or bad over the next twelve months?
SPEAKER_00Well, interest rates are going to be a big telltale. I think I'm hoping that they'll hold that till November.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_00Let it go on Melbourne Cup Day like they normally do.
SPEAKER_01Yep, sneak it through while everybody's drunk.
SPEAKER_00That's right, that's exactly right. So that being the case, but traditionally in Harvey Bay, from now until right through till next year, we normally have a good run. So if there's not interest rates or not much, we should have a good run right through. I'm hoping till probably the end of January at least.
SPEAKER_01All right. And to finish it off, what's your uh one piece of advice for a seller and for a buyer in this current market?
SPEAKER_00In this current market? Do your research. Listen to your listen to your agent.
SPEAKER_01Is this the seller or the buyer you're referring to?
SPEAKER_00Both. Because like buyers will come and ask questions and sellers will ask questions, but they ask different questions.
SPEAKER_01So, you know, and it's just I think listen to them and do your research and know what you're buying is how's the best way for a a buyer to do some research on our market that if they want to get into, you know, where to live or what to buy or what the averages are?
SPEAKER_00Chat GPT.
SPEAKER_01Is it so that's you you're starting to find that they're actually using AI?
SPEAKER_00I'm getting people say, you know, like I've I've looked on I've um just researched chat G and I ask where and they'll say ChatGPT. Because domain bring things out and realestate.com brings things out, but we're always happy. I get a lot of in our rent role, I get a lot of people contacting me saying what's the market doing? When should we sell? What should we do? So you do get a lot of people ringing and talking, and I'm happy to talk to people about that.
SPEAKER_01Yep. All right. Once again, thanks for joining us. And I don't think it's all doom and gloom out there. I've been doing a few statistical podcasts, and I think our market is in a bit of a bubble, and we're way more protected than the capital city, so and we just mean need to remain positive and take the positives out of it. Yeah, and we we need to be pitching a positive story for our market right through. So that's right. All right, thanks again, Kim. Okay. See you again next time.
