Showing posts with label Brisbane Skytower. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brisbane Skytower. Show all posts

Sunday, January 13, 2019

Brisbane Apartment Market Update

In the downtown area of Brisbane, there are a few new apartment buildings adding stock to the market.  These include:

  • Mary Lane which is on top of the newly opened Westin Hotel in Mary Street, with many apartments sitting empty (this is the replacement for 111+222 that did not go ahead)
  • 443 Queen Street, on the Brisbane River, which is currently under construction
  • Brisbane SkyTower, which is nearing completion but with the lower floors occupied prior to completion (this is the other part of the replacement for 111+222 that did not go ahead)
  • The One Residents at Brisbane Quarter (which is where the W Hotel is located), currently under construction
  • Spire Apartments on Queen St, but not riverfront, complete but with very few new apartments available for sale

For sales of existing apartments, the trends depend upon the building (quality and location).  Ray White has recently published a report of sales from October 2018 to December 2018.  It shows:

- In some buildings, there have been no sales.  These are good quality buildings, in good locations, with large apartments and fewer apartments.  The owners don't want to sell.  There are less renters and more owner occupiers.  An example is Admiralty Towers Two, at 501 Queen St on the river.

- In some buildings, there are a few sales, and there have been capital gains over the past 10 years.  For example, in this period, a large 1 bedroom in Quay West on Alice St has increased in price from about $390,000 to $525,000.  Riverplace has also done well over the past 10 years.

- In buildings which are in second rate locations, with a poor quality build, there have been no capital gains over the past ten years, and in reality, capital losses.  Buildings by Devine (and the people who did this are now at Metro) are an example.  For example, in Festival Towers, a 2 bed, 2 bath, 1 car was selling for about $500,000 ten years ago, and one sold recently for $470,000.  In Charlotte Towers, 1 bed 1 bath no car apartments have been selling consistently in the price range of $300,000 to $330,000 for the past 10 years with no capital gain.  Unilodge (which is really student accommodation) has stayed flat at the $125,000 to $130,000 range for ten years.


Saturday, June 17, 2017

Brisbane off-the-plan market "subdued"

Place Real Estate Agents issue a quarterly report as to Brisbane apartment sales.  It is worth studying.  See Place Projects website.

From their recent report for the March 2017 quarter:

As expected, the March 2017 quarter brought another period of subdued sales activity across Inner Brisbane’s off the plan apartment market as sales momentum continues to soften.

The Inner Brisbane apartment market saw just 272 unconditional transactions take place throughout the rst quarter of 2017, a substantial decline of 67% from the same period 12 months prior, which recorded 828 unconditional sales. Meanwhile, the weighted average sale price recovered over the past 12 month period, increasing by 5% from $602,415 in the March 2016 period to $629,963 in the March 2017 period.
  • Inner Brisbane’s off the plan apartment market recorded 272 unconditional transactions over the March quarter, the lowest level of sales since the June 2011 period. This re ects a 13.7% decline from the December 2016 quarter.
  • Just over $171.4 million worth of apartment sales were recorded throughout the quarter.
  • There are currently 67 projects being sold off the plan in Inner Brisbane, with just two projects reporting for the rst time during the quarter. These include Augustus Residences and The One, adding an additional 151 apartments to the market.
  • A weighted average sale price of $629,963 was recorded for
    the period, an increase of 5% from the corresponding period
    12 months prior. This is indicative of a slight change in the product mix across the market, resulting in higher sale prices.

  • Augustus Residences, located in Toowong, was the top performer for the quarter, recording 61 unconditional transactions. 
The Brisbane CBD saw very little activity during the March 2017 quarter, with just 16 unconditional transactions recorded for the period. With no new projects released throughout the quarter, the CBD continues to sell down current apartment stock.


A weighted average sale price of $668,750 was recorded for the three month period, re ecting a 3.8% decline from the previous quarter, indicating a slight increase in the level of investment stock that transacted during the period. Brisbane Skytower recorded the highest number of unconditional transactions across the CBD market during the March quarter, recording a total of 12 sales.

The majority of transactions that occurred within the precinct were in two bedroom con gurations, accounting for 88% of total sales. The remaining 12% of transactions for the period were in one bedroom configurations.

A total of 225 out of 1,498 apartments remain for sale across four projects in the CBD including The Midtown, 111 Quay Apartments, Skytower and Mary Lane. 



Wednesday, April 1, 2015

No oversupply in Inner Brisbane for Apartments?

"Brisbane's inner-city apartment market is a long way from being oversupplied, according to leading real estate adviser Urbis.
Issuing its detailed inner-city report on Wednesday, the group reported that a record 1500 sales had been made in the December quarter from 111 apartment projects. The September quarter recorded 1400 and such numbers have not been seen since 2007.
Urbis economic and market research director Mal Aikman said future supply was "not an issue" and that investors from Sydney and Melbourne were seeing value in Brisbane.
"Looking forward what we find is that in the first and second quarters of 2015 there are about 5000 apartments available for sale," Mr Aikman said.  "At the current rate of demand, that would equate to a sales rate of about 4000 apartments. So demand is slightly behind, but not significantly, and we're a long way from saying there's an oversupply or a glut."
Urbis noted that the Brisbane central business district had a huge surge in sales almost entirely driven by AMP Capital and Billbergia's Skytower, which saw 415 sales worth $267 million."
In my opinion, Urbis is overly optimistic.  There may be buyers for off the plan apartments, but will there be enough renters?  I suspect that most buyers in Brisbane Skytower are from China.

The Brisbane Times provides this gloss:

He admitted prices for new apartments were highly unlikely to rise in the coming year due to the increased supply and stopped short of guaranteeing they would fall.  However, he indicated tumbling price tags to live in the inner-city were probable.  "Our view is prices aren't likely to rise but whether they will fall really depends on the developers," he said.

Sunday, October 26, 2014

Brisbane Skytower

Pre-marketing has commenced for Brisbane Skytower, said to be the tallest residential tower in Brisbane when it is completed.

It is being developed by Billbergia on the old Vision tower site (now called 111 + 222).

It has four sections, a downtown section, an uptown section, a skycity section and a skyrise section.  The starting price for what I guess is a one bedroom apartment starts at $425,000 in the downtown section and increases to a minimum of $595,000 in the skyrise section.

In less than a city block, there are more than 2,000 apartments coming online.  There are three towers, Skytower (at 222 Margaret Street), Abian (on the corner of Alice and Albert) and Camelot (on the corner of Albert and Margaret).  Seems like a glut to me.