Perth power couple’s Yallingup estate hits the market amidst South West property shortage

Mr Poynton said the listing was opportunistic after real estate agents started showing interest in the property.

“There has been this real COVID period pick-up which is partially catch up for a market that hasn’t done anything for a long time,” he said.

Mr Poynton said more people were realising the South West was an amazing region with its forests, beaches, restaurants and vineyards and were looking to buy.

The estate has been used for weddings and Mr Poynton said the property had a lot of infrastructure for anyone looking to run a business with facilities such as a commercial kitchen.

As a visitor to the region for close to 30 years, Mr Poynton said the couple would like to find another property in the area if the lodge sold.

Mack Hall Real Estate South West representative Mitch Thorson lives in the Margaret River region and says the demand for property in the region has been raging on since early 2020.

“What seemed like it was going to emerge as a trend back then has probably become more ongoing,” he said.

“It feels like it’s accelerating, now we’re in the rare position where probably for the first time since the global financial crisis we’ve got more buyers than sellers.

“The theory of supply and demand is now in favour of the seller.”

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Mr Thorson said to get new listing was becoming a bit of an issue but there was still plenty of interest from WA buyers.

“The general feedback I get is people are saying the Margaret River region is essentially the most bio-secure area in the world just about in terms of our positioning on COVID,” he said.

“Conversations are generally evolving around to something about the fact to do with biosecurity or they’ve realised Margaret River is just as nice as the South West of France or the Mediterranean and it’s just down the road.”

Properties which have sold in the past few months include a $3.5 million home on the vaunted St Alouarn Place with panoramic views of the Leeuwin Naturalist Ridge National Park, a $2.5 million riverbank home and a $1.86 million hill-top house with ocean and river mouth views.

Real Estate Institute WA vice president Joe White, who runs JMW Real Estate out of Dunsburough, said Margaret River and Dunsburough had been strong for sales but the interest had expanded to places like Augusta and Walpole.

“The small acreages around Bridgetown are selling well, even Collie has seen people buy holiday homes,” he said.

“When we get to February you’ll look back and say the market jumped five per cent in October, November and December.

“A place I appraised at $490,000 a year ago we sold at $545,000, so there is a 10 per cent jump in that.

“It can’t maintain this rate but I think the thing to recognise is we’re coming off a very low base for a very long time.”

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Mr White said there had been a six-year downturn but the bottom line now was there was a real shift happening of West Australians from the city to the regions.

“I think that will continue it’s people moving here to live, it’s not just holiday homes, it’s demographic change,” he said.

“That was happening before but it’s happening at twice the rate we thought it would have pre-COVID.”