"The last 12 months was awful; we were living on a main road and it was noisy. Even though we had a view, it was a nice house with a view on the worst street in Sydney."
Last year the pair finally pulled up stumps, moving from a rented four-bedroom house on Balmoral's Spit Rd to a six-bedroom mansion on the Gold Coast - and cutting their accommodation expenses in half.
The luxury waterfront property in the Sovereign Islands gated community rents for $1,318 a week, and the Brossmans never want to leave the area.
They're planning to buy a similar property when one comes up for sale in the exclusive enclave, accessed via a bridge from the mainland, with the expectation of snaring a similar mansion for about $2 million.
"Every car on the island is a sports car, either a Porsche or a Lamborghini. It's that kind of lifestyle - for half of what we were paying," Ms Brossman said.
"It's beautiful, there's cafes everywhere, I can walk everywhere, it's a big community and there's a big pub and lots of restaurants, and people are really friendly. It's been the best decision."
The Gold Coast central business district is a half-hour's drive away, but she said she "hardly ever goes there" as she has everything she needs nearby.
"My husband goes fishing off our jetty at lunchtime and I watch the dolphins go past my bedroom most weeks," she said.
"It's a different lifestyle to being in Sydney, but to be honest we never left Balmoral anyway! I don't miss anything."
The idea of moving north came when the Brossmans' 13-year-old son had the opportunity to apply for an academic excellence program on the Gold Coast.
"We came up and went to the interview and said if he got in, we'd give it a go," Ms Brossman said.
While it was a big adjustment for the teen to make, he soon came around after his parents started flying his friends up for weekend visits.
The pair both work from home as marketing consultants, with Mr Brossman flying down to Sydney for client meetings.
"It wasn't a matter of wanting to leave Sydney, but when we came up here and saw what we got for what we were paying, we just had to do it," Ms Brossman said.
"I said to Steve, 'I won't move unless I can have the same Balmoral lifestyle', and so the only place we could find was Sovereign Island."
Queensland had an obvious appeal for "wannabe property owners living in Australia's most expensive cities", Propertyology managing director Simon Pressley said.
The Brisbane-based buyer's agent said the sunshine state had more going for it than the average Sydneysider gave it credit for.
"It not only has affordability in spades, but the further north you go the warmer the climate is," Mr Pressley said.
"Right now, it's less than a week from winter and it's 26 degrees with not a cloud in the sky."
He said the state was home to plenty of strong regional cities where jobs and lifestyle factors coincided with affordable property prices.
"I'd say the top of my list would be Cairns," Mr Pressley said. "It is tropical Queensland paradise, and the median house price is $422,000 for a good quality three- or four-bedroom house.
"It's not a tiny little regional town, it's got every bit of infrastructure that a capital city's got - plus the Great Barrier Reef and inland tropical forests.
"You've got awesome weather all year round, employment numbers are showing really positive trends, it's just got an awesome lifestyle."
He also highlighted Toowoomba, an inland city located an hour and a half's drive from Brisbane.
"It's really popular with students, it's got a strong education sector with some top-quality private schools and universities, and a typical house costs about $369,000. In Sydney you're going to get a cupboard for that, aren't you?"
The best thing about Toowoomba? Its unemployment rate was below the national average and better than Brisbane, he said.
He cautioned against investing in Brisbane's inner-city apartments, predicting a fall in prices over the next couple of years due to oversupply.
"The more we hear about Sydney being expensive and it's so hard for millennials to get in, well Sydney's never ever going to get cheaper," Mr Pressley said.
"So the smart Gen Ys need to think, 'well that ain't going to change so what am I going to do about it?'
"Probably the most appealing option is moving where it's more affordable and working out what other things are important to you there. If it's weather, if it's jobs, Queensland's got it."
