Sarah Webb is a freelance journalist.
A family of six outbid a 26-year-old to claim the last unrenovated house in one of Brisbane’s most tightly held streets.
The sale in the outer suburb came on one of the city’s weakest auction weekends on record.
The former captain and Brownlow medallist sold the home for $2.5 million, and it has been sold again for almost double that.
Real estate agents said the federal budget had led to more cautious buyers with tighter purse strings, but good properties in top locations were still transacting well.
The home in one of Brisbane’s leafy riverside south smashed the suburb house price record by more than a quarter of a million dollars.
The couple were up against a big organisation for one of Mount Crosby’s last privately held parcels within a council-controlled pocket.
Despite reports Brisbane’s real estate market has softened, the selling agent says a lack of supply continues to drive demand.
Brisbane prices have overtaken Melbourne’s and are second only to Sydney’s, but there are signs of a shift.
There are regional spots more expensive than blue-chip Byron Bay, but tight supply and enduring brand power are helping it stage a comeback.
The selling agent said the owners had chosen to offload the home after finding the renovations too hard to manage from afar. But it turned a profit.