New Q1 Observation Deck

Queenslands Gold Coast has a new attraction!
From December visitors to Surfers Paradise will be able to visit the new observation deck on the 80th level of the Worlds Tallest Residential Tower - Q1

Vision - New Brisbane Apartment Development

370 apartments/ 5,100 sqm retail/ 27,000 sqm commercial/ 700 carparking spaces/ 2,000 sqm 2 level observation deck/ commencement date 2006

Austcorp is creating a new icon for Brisbane in the 21st century

At 80 storeys, Vision will be Brisbane’s tallest and most beautiful building… incorporating retail, commercial and residential space.

It will be a defining statement in architectural and design innovation.

Vision is more than just a tall building…it’s a vertical village designed around the needs of the people who live there as well as inner city Brisbane residents.

Its large retail plaza will effortlessly connect Mary and Margaret streets, giving Brisbane a new and vibrant pedestrian precinct.

Not only does Vision create new design standards in commercial and residential space it also gives Brisbane its first public Observation deck. From the 60th level, this observation deck will command sweeping 360 degree views for as far as the eye can see.

Vision has been designed by people, for people…giving back to the city of Brisbane a new standard in inner city living.

Estimated value on completion is $873 million."

The view from Vision

Rents soar as housing runs low

RESIDENTIAL rents are on the rise for the first time in five years, driven by a sharp fall in the number of Melbourne houses available.

Agents report rent increases of $10 to $20 a week in inner suburbs, and the head of property research at Macquarie Bank, Rod Cornish, has tipped solid rises next year.

Official vacancy figures to be released by the Real Estate Institute of Victoria today are expected to show a further decline in Melbourne's residential vacancy figures.

Inner-city vacancy rates peaked at 4.2 per cent in September 2004 but had fallen to 2.7 per cent by August this year.

A 3 per cent vacancy rate is considered a balanced market and the sharp decline is expected to put further upward pressure on rents.

Mr Cornish said the last apartments in Melbourne's high-rise construction phase would settle in the first half of next year and he predicted strong rental demand would pick up in the second half of the year after the supply was absorbed.

While reluctant to put a figure on the overall rise in rents in the cycle, Mr Cornish said the high number of immigrants choosing to settle in Melbourne and the trend for people to delay purchasing a home until well into their 30s was underpinning demand.

Mr Cornish said the rent cycle's upswing would be felt more in Sydney, where there had been little construction over the past 2½ years.

Adrian Jones, of Noel Jones Real Estate, said some rental managers had started reviewing rents and tenants had accepted increases of between 5 and 7 per cent without "blinking an eye".
Mr Jones predicted rents would rise by up to 10 per cent over the next 12 months.
He said the eastern suburbs company had 3600 properties under management and in the past year its vacancy rate had declined from 2.5 per cent to under 1 per cent.

There was strong demand for top-end properties that had suffered falls in rent of between 10 and 25 per cent two years ago.
He tipped rents would bounce back as demand was very strong for executive family residences.

"Traditionally the busiest time of the year for property managers is December and January, but this year offices have been overrun with quality applicants months earlier than usual," he said.

Andrews Corporation business and development manager Mariam McDonald said rents had risen by $10 to $20 a week in inner suburbs and in the city centre there was good demand for quality apartments.

This was despite a record number of 3090 apartments settling in the CBD, Southbank and Docklands this year.

Tim Nicoll, of Melbourne City Real Estate, said top-end dwellings in the city centre were commanding strong prices, with three-bedroom, two-bathroom residences renting for $800 to $1000 a week.

But when multiple high-rise towers had been released to the market at the same time it had resulted in a short-term decline in rents, he said.

Apartments project fails

Some of Australia's best-known celebrities could lose hundreds of thousands of dollars after the collapse of plans for a $123 million apartment development.

Administrators were yesterday appointed to recover deposits totalling $5.3 million for up to 100 unsecured creditors in former high-flying property developer Gavin Muir's failed project in Port Melbourne.

Documents seen by the Herald Sun list Channel 9 morning show host Kerri-Anne Kennerley, football legend Ron Barassi and media celebrity Sam Kekovich as having paid deposits of tens of thousands of dollars each for the exclusive off-the-plan apartments.

Apartments, which were to have been built on the site in Bay St, were being sold for up to $800,000.

Joint administrators Nicholas Martin and Ian Carson of PPB will investigate Bay Street Corporation. 'We understand a number of creditors are keen to see this matter resolved quickly,' Mr Martin said in a statement yesterday.

'PPB is eager to work through the issues with a view to determining the future of the company.'

It is believed the vacant land in Bay St was sold to First State Developments for up to $20 million before the appointment of PPB.

It is believed the Bank of Scotland was a secured creditor and has"

Eureka blockade: apartment sales slump hits city projects

MELBOURNE'S apartment sales downturn has hit the city's two largest projects.

Eureka, the 566-apartment, 92-storey skyscraper Grocon is building at Southbank, is a year behind schedule and has 134 unsold apartments more than five years after going on sale.

Australand's Freshwater Place will be completed on time in February or March next year, but of its 535 apartments, 219 are still for sale, even though they have been on the market for about three years.

While both developers deny either project is in trouble, the lack of sales is further evidence that the inner-Melbourne market is clearly oversupplied, with 2600 apartments due to be completed over the next year - 1090 of those before Christmas.

Central Equity, the largest apartment developer in Southbank and broader Melbourne, has already pulled the pin on further towers, while agents claimed this week that there had been a 'discernible' drop in sales inquiries over the past month or two.

'It's very quiet, perhaps the quietest I have ever known it,' said one seller, who did not want to be named but who has specialised in apartments for 10 years.

At Eureka, selling agents Hocking Stuart have sold 43 2apartments, settling 320 of them with a total value of about $200million.

Most, according to Eureka spokesman Benny Aroni, a high-profile lawyer and brother-in-law to Eureka third-owner, businessman and property investor Tab Fried, are between levels 24 and 64 of the building.

That means the Eureka developers - Grocon, architect Nonda Katsalidis and Mr Fried - still need to find buyers for the most expensive apartments, at the top of the 300m tower.

These include entire floors, which can be bought as shells, on levels 85 to 87.

Prices range from about $6.5 million to $10 million.

Mr Aroni said apartment sales had started in August, 2000, and in a perfect world most, if not all, would have sold by now.

However, he said the developers had had to contend with negative market sentiment and "valuations that have gone backwards".

Mr Aroni said he did not think the year-long construction delay had affected sales.

Meanwhile, apartments continued to be sold at a rate of about one a week, and he remained confident that once the building was completed, either in February or March , sales would pick up.

Few Eureka re-sales are advertised on the internet, with about 20 owners all seeking higher prices than they paid off-the-plan.

One level 41 owner who paid $960,000 in November, 2000, is attempting to sell for $1.2 million.

At Freshwater Place, apartments have sold at a square metre rate up to $10,800, but it's the scarcity of buyers, rather than what they are prepared to pay, that's hampered Australand.

Australand's national apartments manager Rob Pradolin said that while sales had slowed, that was because many owner-occupiers were reluctant to buy off the plan.

Mr Pradolin said he was very confident sales would turn around.

"When they see the finished product they're going to realise that there's nothing like this available in Australia," he said.

Grocon's $450m Vision splendid

MELBOURNE builder Grocon has won the $450 million construction contract for Austcorp Ltd's 79-storey Vision tower in the Brisbane CBD.

Austcorp executive chairman Trevor Chappell said yesterday that negotiations with Grocon were being finalised.

Grocon's experience in building Melbourne's 92-storey Eureka Tower was a key factor in the firm winning the job, he said.

It will be the first time the Grollo family company Grocon had built anything in Brisbane.

Grocon had advised Austcorp throughout Vision's design and approval phases, Mr Chappell said.

Austcorp Queensland manager Kerry Spencer, said Grocon was not taking equity in Vision and the soon-to-be-signed deal would be a straight construction contract.

Grocon engineering general manager David Emery said the company specialised in tall towers.

'We have built six of the 10 tallest buildings in Australia ... so we are looking forward to building the tallest one in Brisbane,' he said.

Grocon first branched out of Melbourne into Sydney with its construction of Governor Phillip Tower in the early 1990s.

'That was the business plan model, to move interstate on the back of a large project, and Vision fits that same mould,' he said.

The $900 million Vision will "