“What was really slammed home during Covid was that the thing we were having ripped away from us was the lifestyle we enjoyed so much. “I think many people, particularly from the southern states, have had a cathartic moment and want to pursue a different dream in their life. “Places like the Whitsundays are definitely more front of mind now in so far as they’re not high population and they’re generally regarded as healthy pristine places where you’ve got your own space,” he says. Hamilton Island chief executive Glenn Bourke says the region is in the midst of a rebirth led by the renewed focus on lifestyle and a paradigm population shift due to Covid. Knocked flat by the global financial crisis and then two cyclones, in 20, the Whitsunday property market is back stronger than ever as a pandemic-induced boom plays out up and down the Queensland coast. “I’ve got another seven contracts out at the moment just waiting to be signed-that’s unheard of.” “We’re actually expecting it to get even crazier when the borders open up,” he says. He laughs when asked if there are any signs of the sales boom slowing. “We used to sell about two to four houses per annum and, so far, there have been 23 house sales during the past 12 months. “On average, before Covid, there were $30 million of deals a year on the island and $50 million was a good year.
Prices for some of the properties on “Hammo” as it is affectionately known by locals have skyrocketed by up to 30 per cent and, not surprisingly, Singleton is still shaking his head.
Since then, Singleton estimates there have been a total of $130 million in property transactions on the resort island, with almost a quarter of its privately owned houses changing hands as well as a swag of apartments-including a harbour-front penthouse with a marina berth for $8.4 million. “These were houses that had been on the market for a while and the next minute they’re selling for prices we hadn’t seen for years,” Singleton says. Not long after, another of the island’s waterfront mansions was snapped up for “just under $6 million”-also sight unseen. “It was like ‘wow, what the hell just happened?’,” says Sotheby’s Wayne Singleton, who negotiated the sale. Out of the blue in September last year, the Whitsundays-Queensland’s iconic archipelago of 74 tropical islands-was hit by its biggest property wave as a run to paradise began from Australia’s Covid-gripped capital cities.Īt the northern end of Hamilton Island a $6-million deal was sealed, sight unseen, by a southern buyer for Lotus House, a four-bedroom hilltop residence overlooking the verdigris depths of the Coral Sea. There was no ripple of warning across its famed passage of azure waters.