With a population of over 112,000 people, it’s easy to understand that Mackay a large regional centre with many different suburbs.
In part 4 of our case study, helping Serg to purchase an investment property in Mackay, QLD, we’ll provide some insight into the different suburbs of Mackay as we investigate which areas will provide the best property for Serg’s investment.
If you haven’t yet, check out:
Part 1 – Queensland Buyers Agent Case Study – Introducing Serg
Part 2 – Queensland Buyers Agent Case Study – Buying Criteria
Part 3 – Queensland Buyers Agent Case Study – Location Analysis – Mackay
As part of our research into Mackay for Serg we investigated and reviewed 15 areas of Mackay and provided Serg with our assessment of the area itself, the style of housing (including pictures), the services in that area and our recommendations on investing in the area with regards to his investment goals.
I’ve picked out just a few of those suburbs which I found interesting to include here in this article, but there are quite a few others that I would also take a look at, depending on what your overall investing strategy and goals are.
Andergrove
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Andergrove is a great spot, very close to the centre of Mackay but North of the river. It has very good facilities for families, including a choice of schools and shopping centres.
Andergrove has pockets of older style housing (60s, 70s) with weatherboard and cladding, it has some 80s and 90s brick style housing and it also has pockets of new developments. There are a many areas that are well kept, family style homes and a few areas where homes look a little ‘rough around the edges’.
Andergrove is an area that is sought after by families and has good rental yield and low vacancy rates.
| Andergrove 4740 | |
| Median House Price | $410,000 |
| Weekly advertised Median Rent | $460 |
| Rental Yield | 6% |
| Time on Market | 76 days |
| 1 year capital growth | 4% |
| 5 year capital growth | 11% |
| 10 year capital growth | 13% |
| Vacancy Rate | 1% |
| Vendor Discounting | 5.7% |
Mount Pleasant
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Mount Pleasant is one of the ‘good’ suburbs in Mackay. Before all of the new developments have sprung up over the past years, Mount Pleasant was ‘the’ suburb to live in and had the most exclusive street in Mackay. Much of Mount Pleasant is elevated and contains houses from the 70’s with many renovated and looking good. There is also examples of newer homes being built on older blocks where the original home has been knocked down.
The suburb has a nice feel to it and the elevated areas offer some brilliant views and some very big homes have been built in spots to take advantage of the views. The streets have a well kept feel in most of Mount Pleasant and the whole suburb has a bit of an ‘older but gentrified’ feel to it.
There is a small pocket of new homes behind the Greenfields Shopping Centre and then moving back from there toward the centre of Mackay homes become older and there is the occasional ‘rough’ looking pocket.
Mount Pleasant has a reasonable shopping centre and some larger stores, such as Bunnings, KMart, Coles, Sams Warehouse and more. It’s close to the Mater Hospital and all of the ‘big’ shops along the highway going into Mackay.
I really liked this location and thought that there could be some good opportunity for older style homes and manufacturing some growth through renovation in what is a highly sought after pocket of Mackay.
| Mount Pleasant 4740 | |
| Median House Price | $430,000 |
| Weekly advertised Median Rent | $545 |
| Rental Yield | 7% |
| Time on Market | 82 days |
| 1 year capital growth | 2% |
| 5 year capital growth | 2% |
| 10 year capital growth | 11% |
| Vacancy Rate | 1% |
| Vendor Discounting | 6.5% |
West Mackay
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West Mackay is a great location in terms of proximity to the centre of Mackay. It’s close to the hospital and has a couple of primary schools. It is also one of the old areas of Mackay. There are some very nice streets with a mixture of older style high set homes and low set homes. It’s also an interesting mix here of weatherboard, cladding and brick homes.
There are some really nice spots in West Mackay, but there are also some streets and pockets that are ‘not so nice’. You can pick up a nice ‘cheapie’ here, but you would want to ensure that you pick your location and property well.
This area would be good for a renovation project house – in terms of the actual properties and the evidence of re-gentrification starting here, though of course if your plan was to flip the property then you would definitely need to research the financial viability of such a project.
| West Mackay 4740 | |
| Median House Price | $377,500 |
| Weekly advertised Median Rent | $480 |
| Rental Yield | 7 % |
| Time on Market | 75 days |
| 1 year capital growth | 2% |
| 5 year capital growth | 10% |
| 10 year capital growth | 12% |
| Vacancy Rate | 1% |
| Vendor Discounting | 5.9% |
So there you have it! This is just a few of the spots in Mackay that offer some good investing potential. There are others of course and each location should be assessed against what it is that you are looking for in a property that will fit with your strategy and investing goals. We presented our location analysis to Serg for his consideration in light of his investing goal and in the next part of our case study with Serg, narrow down our suburb search and start getting looking at some properties that meet his buying criteria.
If you’d like to learn more about Mackay or are interested in an investment in Mackay, feel free to contact me using the form below, I’d be happy to tell you more!
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