In June last year the alternative real estate fund manager behind Reside Communities’ five luxury retirement villages announced it was embarking on an $800 million seniors living land lease portfolio of 1200 homes.
GreenFort and Gaw Capital said it had bought Willow Village, in Southside, a semi-rural locality in Queensland's Gympie Region, which has 26 homes on a 25,000msq parcel and an adjacent 75,000msq of land with development approval for a further 150 homes. It followed GreenFort's acquisition of a 57,000msq piece of land in the city of Hervey Bay, 290km north of Brisbane, which has approval to develop 132 manufactured homes.
Now architects Cottee Parker, planning consultants RPS, landscape architects LAUD Ink and Green Fort have lodged with Toowoomba Regional Council a development application for a $105 million 422-home land lease community on 25.09ha at Gowrie Junction, a rural locality 13km northwest of Toowoomba.
GreenFort partner Adam Vaggelas revealed it has also bought 14.76ha of land at Elliott Heads, 200m from the oceanfront, near Bundaberg, 370km north of Brisbane, with approval in place for 328 homes. It is part of a master-planned South Beach development that will include a shopping centre, resort and tavern. The community will feature two and three-bedroom homes and resort-style facilities including a lounge, café, bar, cinema, gymnasium, pool, bowls green, BBQ areas, tennis and pickle ball courts.
When completed, Liven Communities will have about 1040 homes in its portfolio in total.
“The first stage of our Hervey Bay community was 90% sold within days of the project’s launch with Stage 2 also experiencing strong demand,” Co-Founder Adam Vaggelas said.
In Gowrie Junction there will be 406 two-bedroom units of 130sqm to 186sqm, and 16 three-bedroom units of 236sqm each. Each home includes an alfresco area of 8 to 16sqm, with units featuring either single or double garages.
The development “provides two dedicated areas of high-quality communal/recreational spaces for residents to encourage social interaction and healthy lifestyles” including a two-storey country club with a 40-seat cinema, indoor golf simulator, billiards room, various lounge areas and a cafe. The ground floor would include games rooms, private dining facilities and a salon.
A wellness centre would provide facilities appropriate for seniors’ accommodation.
“The concept for the wellness centre has been designed to include an outdoor tennis/pickle ball court sited next to an indoor venue that will comprise an indoor pool and spa, a gymnasium, a golf simulator and a series of lounge spaces, meeting rooms and a cafe,” the application documents state.
A communal campervan and RV washdown area is also included in the plans and there will be 26,385sq m of community open space with bio-retention basins ranging from 800sqm to 1150sgm.
“Toowoomba and Elliot Heads are sought after seniors living regions, but each face a substantial undersupply of housing due to strong population growth from an aging local population and growing out of catchment migration from retirees seeking a tree or sea change,” Adam said. Our latest projects are well located within these two catchments, positioned close to existing services and further infrastructure either under construction or in the planning stages.”
Check out Retirement living in Queensland on the #1 website villages.com.au