Pat Rafter's $18m Coast home proves hot property

NOOSA is expected to smash its $9.3million house sale record this year when the home of tennis ace Pat Rafter at Sunshine Beach finally sells.

PAT'S PAD: The Sunshine Beach home of tennis ace Pat rafter is on the market for a record price. Picture: Contributed

NOOSA is expected to smash its $9.3million house sale record this year when the home of tennis ace Pat Rafter at Sunshine Beach finally sells.

It is on the market for $18million and Noosa prestige real estate agent Tom Offermann believes it will easily surpass his company's 2016 sale of another beachfront home to a Brisbane buyer.

"It's a record for our company and for the Sunshine Coast," Mr Offermann said.

"Another former world number one player Thomas Muster sold his $5,900,000 riverfront home through our company to a Sydney couple as a holiday home.

"Thomas Muster's former county estate on 88 acres on the Noosa Tableland which is now owned by songwriter Mike Chapman OAM, is being sold through us for $6,000,000, $2,000,000 less than he paid for it and proves there is plenty of value buying remaining in Noosa."

Mr Offermann said Noosa is back in vogue for visitors and investors with "every measure confirming bubbling confidence and prosperity throughout the town."

Aussie tennis legend Pat Rafter's Sunshine Beach home

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He said apartment managers are consistently reporting high occupancy rates up around 90%, and rental "property owners are enjoying the highest income they ever have."

"These tourism dollars are flowing through the entire local economy including hospitality, trades, and every local business," he said.

The International Visitor Survey has recently reported a 73% increase in international visitor spending, seven times the Queensland average, with New Zealanders spending 104% more than last year.

"Our full year auction clearance rate for 2016 was 87%, rivalling even the strongest capital city agencies," he said.

"Sydney buyers have featured strongly among our buyers more than ever before, splashing out on holiday homes and apartments."

He said Sydney people have their own great beaches and harbour with warmer weather than Melbourne, which is why until now they had a relatively low profile in our market.

"For some reason that has changed and Noosa is right on trend for them," he said.

"Noosa has always been served well by Victorians, who treat Noosa as their own beach haven and escape from the cold."

Mr Offermann said the Real Estate Institute reports that Noosa has Queensland's lowest permanent rental vacancy rate of just 1.2% due largely to Noosa's long standing "population cap" town planning policies.

"There is intense buyer competition for the existing housing stocks from four distinct quarters," he said.

"There are owner occupiers, there are people buying for their future intended relocation to Noosa, investors who rent out their properties for holidays or permanents, and buyers who lock up and leave their second homes.

"Noosa's mayor Tony Wellington told me our population growth is next to zero."

Mr Offermann said there is nothing on the horizon that will relieve that pressure and prices will go through a strong growth phase into the near future.