THE BASICS
HARMONY & BRENTWOOD FOREST
Developer: AVID Property Group
Price: Harmony land from $209,350, Brentwood Forest Land from $169,000.
Location: Palmview and Bellbird Park
AVID Property Group is getting retiree savvy with its new developments, looking to include recreation facilities to expand the generations.
LAND developers are starting to look beyond the young family first-home buyer demographic and take note of the growing demand from retirees.
AVID Property Group general manager Bruce Harper said the development industry needed to rethink its strategy and provide developments that would suit young families right through to retirees.”When new developments occurred the major base of people who used to buy into our development were young families,” Mr Harper said.
“And while that’s still a significant part of the development industry, as a whole we’ve never been very good at allowing people to age in the place they are living.
“You’d get all of the recreation facilities designed around young families and then nothing for the teenagers or the ageing population.”
Mr Harper said the fast growing ageing population was going to require developers to turn their minds to retirees and actively think about their needs.“There’s a significant amount of people who are reaching retirement age,” he said.
“Not all will go to retirement communities and they still want to have active lifestyles. We as developers have to look ahead and cater for that.”
AVID is working towards future-proofing its developments from incorporating childcare centres through to partnering with leading retirement living providers to include options in their new masterplanned communities.
“We’re making a specific effort to try and design our communities to future proof for intergenerational changes,” Mr Harper said.
“For example, we provide community facilities, parks and recreation so they can be used by families, and singles and elderly people as they age through the communities.”
Mr Harper said in a typical development a multipurpose oval would be included for cricket, tennis and netball, but the developer was now looking at what the older generation would like to do.“So we’re exploring the possibility of putting in bocce courts and bowls areas. And in terms of recreational facilities we’re looking at facilities such as men sheds and making spaces for women’s facilities as well,” he said.
“We’re exploring whether we can build those into our new communities instead of trying to fit them into communities 30 years down the track.”
In AVID’s $3 billion Harmony project on the Sunshine Coast, Mr Harper said one of the first sales in the new community would be to a retirement village operator.
“Particularly in places like the Sunshine Coast with the Harmony project, the age demographic for the coast is a high percentage of elderly people, so it would be foolish for us not to cater for that.”Source – www.realestate.com.au
