Gold Coast High Rise

The headline of an article on page 21 of the Weekend Australian Financial Review this weekend is "Gold Coast high rise gets a nose bleed."

The article reports that more than $1 billion of apartments purchased at the top of the market are due to settle soon in The Oracle and Juniper's Soul developments.

Lawyers are apparently circling to try to get buyers out of contracts.  For example, it is said that Nyst Lawyers believe buyers can get out of their Soul contracts because the Soul development is now being managed by Mirvac under the Sea Temple brand.  What a crazy argument.  The buyers want to get out of the contracts because the contract price that they promised to pay is now too much.  The buyers took a risk, and lost out.  You have to be very careful when buying off the plan.

The AFR reports that prices in Soul are down about 17%, based on one resale of a 23rd floor three bedroom apartment, 161 sqm, that sold off the plan for $1.8 million and resold in February this year for $1.5 million.