By Sonia Isaacs
DEVELOPER interest is surging ahead in the Hinterland as demand for residential communities catering to the over 50s and retirement lifestyle villages continues to rise.
Big market players like Stockland, TriCare and Reside Communities have all recently acquired either land or existing retirement communities within the Glasshouse Country and Hinterland area.
A Stockland spokesperson, the company behind the previously owned Living Gems Group land lease community (LLC) development at Beerwah, said Stockland Halcyon’s communities had been transforming lifestyle living for over 17 years, with 21 communities either established or in development across the country.
“Our vision at Stockland is to be the leading creator and curator of connected communities, and this is underpinned by our purpose – a better way to live,” they said.
Speaking with GC&M News, Reside Communities CEO and Co-Founder, Glen Brown, said the recent Hinterland purchase of the Maleny Grove retirement village, was a great location for their model of retirement communities.
Mr Brown said Maleny Grove combined both the high quality living that today’s seniors want, alongside a strong sense of community connection and wellbeing for residents.
He said the proposed multi-million dollar overhaul would offer an array of lifestyle and home care support services facilitated by the village.
“We are very excited about Maleny and the hinterland region due to its popularity with local and interstate retirees looking for a beautiful part of Australia to spend their well-earned retirement years”, Mr Brown said.
Recent Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) figures showed the 75-79 age group is still the fastest growing demographic and it is expected that the number of Australians aged over 75 will rise from 2 million to 3.4 million over the next two decades.
Mr Brown said based on these ABS figures, the retirement industry would require another 67,000 homes to be built by 2030 just to meet existing demand, yet the Retirement Living Council says only 18,000 homes are currently planned.
“Pending development approvals, the Maleny Grove expansion will help to meet this strong demand when it comes to retirees in this region,” he said.
Spencer Shaw, President of Maleny Commerce said
over 50/ Retirement Villages were very much part of the mix of housing opportunities in the local region over the last 20 years.
He said it was extremely likely that demand would continue to grow as the aged population also increases.
He said he understood the region presented an attractive location for anyone wanting to live in or to consider relocating to. He said in Maleny, particular interest to aged members of the community was a centralised commercial hub, with numerous medical practices and an excellent public hospital focussed on aged and palliative care.
Mr Shaw said post-covid there has been a real-estate value boom and as with many rural areas on the urban fringe, rental and purchase prices for properties had grown exponentially.
“It would be good to see the these over 50 / Retirement Villages address some of the prohibitive costs for many aging residents so they can continue to live in the region they have contributed so much too,” he added.
Mr Shaw said, overall, the density of the over 50s and Retirement Villages could have many positives for the region, however, he would encourage Governments to incentivise (or at least stop dis-incentivising) affordable housing for residents and workers.
