A young woman who was priced out of the Sydney market has bought her first home in Queensland.
Kayla Rogers, 24, an online female transformation coach, left Sydney in February this year and moved to the Gold Coast, where she currently rents.
Before moving, she engaged a buyer’s agent to help her buy a three-bedroom house in Toowoomba, which cost $550,000.
The property rents for $450 a week, which Rogers said covers most of her mortgage payments.
‘Buying a house in Sydney is a bit ridiculous. So I was able to buy a three-bedroom house in Toowoomba,” she said.
She plans to continue purchasing investment properties while building equity to purchase her dream home.
“When I’m like 33, I would love to move into my dream house,” she said.
“In the meantime, I’ll get investment properties when I can, maybe every two years.”
Kayla Roger, 25, (pictured) bought her first home in Toowoomba, Queensland, after being priced out of her hometown of Sydney
The fitness coach bought the $550,000 three-bedroom, one-bathroom brick home with large front and back gardens (pictured) in February this year, when she was 24. She was able to find tenants immediately and the value of the property has already increased by seven percent
Unlike many of her peers, she bought her three-bedroom house completely on her own, without any financial help from her parents.
This achievement followed years of working seven days a week and diligently saving while living with her parents, who did not charge her rent.
“If you want something bad enough, like anything, you’re going to have to make sacrifices and work hard to get there,” she said.
‘There’s no perfect time and I had money, so I thought I’d just do it.
Inner Toowoomba’s average house price is $591,433 iIt is almost a third of the price of Sydney’s $1.474 million median house price, CoreLogic data shows.
It’s also much cheaper than Brisbane’s increasingly unaffordable midpoint of $973,534 for a house with a backyard.
Little Real Estate executive general manager of sales and marketing James Kirkland said interstate investor interest in Queensland property is “mind-boggling”.
“In some southern states, particularly Sydney, you have young people who want to get on the property ladder and they’re struggling to do so,” he said.
The coach said she was able to save her 20 percent down payment by working at the university seven days a week
“And I think this is a great example of what is driving demand to invest in the Queensland market.”
Mr Kirkland said there were still some big investments happening across the state, especially homes with backyards that yield high rental yields.
There is also renewed interest in Brisbane because of the 2032 Olympic Games.
“The areas that are still doing well are just outside the ten kilometer radius of Brisbane, places like Logan,” he said.