Australian Fibro Shack Makes Come Back!

Well here’s a surprise – the demand for simple beach homes is higher than for over-priced, over-specified, over-designed apartments at the beach.

I don’t mean beautiful, organic, environmentally perfect, sustainable designer homes. Nope this is about the humble beach shack – the simple, small fibro house on bigger a section near the beach. The typical Aussie shack would probably have a larger garage than the rest of the houses footprint. Two bedrooms are the norm, three the exception. There is no marble, no spa bath- and the wooden floors are more rustic than highly polished.

Buyers seem to be looking for the simple life – they want a place where they can relax and not worry about sand damaging the floor or whether the third toilet has been cleaned. Smaller floor areas require less cleaning.  A barbeque can be just  well a barbeque, not a second kitchen.

A recent sale in fibro-shack country was in Patonga – about 1 hour north of Sydney. A two-bedroom cottage features fibro cladding a large garage sold for $550,000. In contrast the $10 million homes at nearby Palm Beach are still looking for buyers.

Typical Australian Shack - Now in Demand?

The purchaser liked the ability to park his boat in the shed, open up a cold one and survey his empire from the porch without arguing with the neighbors whether consuming alcohol on the terrace was legal under the strata management rules. He probably also likes that fact that his mortgage is not spoiling the taste of the beer and that he doesn’t need a second income to pay for the strata fees.

So if you are an overseas property investor – watch out for over-priced, over-specified beach townhouses or apartments  – the Australians don’t want them, the resell may be tricky.

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