KEY POINTS:
New Zealanders looking for holiday property overseas spent up big last year in Australia's residential property market - ringing up more than $70 million in sales in ever-popular Queensland.
Kiwis spent $27 million on the Gold Coast alone in 2005-2006, second only to the Japanese who invested $30.7m. Total foreign property investment in Queensland for the period was about $450 million.
New Zealanders are not only seeking to own holiday retreats across the ditch. Murray Cleland, president of NZ's Real Estate Institute, said that while Queensland's Sunshine Coast north of Brisbane and as far up as Port Douglas are probably the most popular overseas places for Kiwis to own holiday homes or investments, Fiji is close behind. "There's a number of people buying into new apartments being built in Denerau."
Despite the latest coup to hit Fiji, real estate agent Bayleys, which has a new office in the Martintar district of Nadi, is in the islands for the long haul. South Pacific Island sales manager Chester Rendell said the agency is still fielding inquiries on a range of listings, mainly in Momi and Denerau, despite military government clamps on land sales.
Although the December coup and a sales freeze created uncertainty, the agency's experience from previous coups showed that after a short-term drop-off in activity, things soon returned to normal.
Peter McGrath, chairman of the Real Estate Institute of Queensland, said New Zealand property buyers have been "very, very important" in the region since the early 80s. He said the cosmopolitan nature of the Gold Coast and its proximity to Brisbane, the state capital, made such property very attractive.
Hamilton-based House of Travel business manager Alastair Calder bought land in Fiji with two other families a few years ago. But he said he knew customers and friends who had purchased holiday homes even further afield - in the south of France, or Tuscany in Italy.
Land prices in some parts of Europe were almost on a par with New Zealand property, making it attractive to finan-cially secure Kiwi baby-boomers facing retirement.
