Veteran Gold Coast property figure Nicholas Brown dies, aged 49

Tributes are flowing for a leading Gold Coast property industry figure who died suddenly this week.

Veteran Gold Coast property agent Nicholas Brown has been remembered following his death at age 49. Picture: NIGEL HALLETT

Heartfelt tributes are flowing for a leading Gold Coast property industry figure who died suddenly.

Nicholas Brown, a Glitter Strip commercial property identity, reportedly died in his sleep on Monday night.

Mr Brown, 49, was co-owner of Broadbeach property agency Retail Direct and his business partner Steven Black was among many to pay tribute.

“Over the past 25 years, Nicholas and I have worked together and I am proud to have been his business partner and one of his best friends,” Mr Black posted on LinkedIn.

“Nicholas was loved by so many of us who will now share in this sorrow.

“We truly have lost one of the better ones.

“Our team will continue the legacy and make Nicholas proud for what we set out to achieve.

“A dear friend, life-long business partner and a part of the Black family, I will miss him terribly.

“Such a kind hearted soul, Nicholas way too young to be taken from us.”

Mr Brown had battled severe kidney disease and told The Courier-Mail in 2019 of his fight for survival and eventual kidney transplant.

“I was told by the nephrologist (kidney specialist) that I was not going to be here in 12 months if we didn’t do something about it,” he said at the time.

By the time Mr Brown started dialysis in April 2019, the disease was at stage 5 and his kidneys were functioning at just 10 per cent.

Also a lifelong diabetic, he was on the waiting list for both a kidney and pancreas transplant at Sydney’s Westmead Hospital.

As fate would have it, NSW shut its borders to Victoria as the Covid-19 pandemic raged in 2020 and in August that year, Mr Brown received a 1am phone call from the hospital telling him to get the first flight to Sydney.

“The transplant team had to say no to all the would-be organ recipients from Victoria, so six of us from Queensland ended up with the organs,” he said.

There were more health dramas for the veteran property agent when he suffered a massive heart attack three weeks after the transplant as his body struggled to adjust to the shock of the new organs.

But he battled back to health and opened a new office at Broadbeach with long-term colleague Steven Black, who looked after the business while Mr Brown was ill.

“I’m still on about 30 pills a day but it’s nothing compared with having to inject myself with insulin four times a day or having dialysis three times a week for five hours,” he said at the time.

Mr Brown was given the option to make contact with his donor’s family but chose not to ‘for emotional reasons’.

“I’m eternally grateful to his family, who I believe live in Brisbane, but with everything I’d been through, I wasn’t up to it emotionally,” he said.

Mr Brown said he felt ‘blessed’ and encouraged people to register as organ donors.

Originally published as Veteran Gold Coast property figure Nicholas Brown dies, aged 49