‘It’s insane’: boom in property young guns making millionaire homes go viral
“There’s been $20m properties, $15m properties … and I’m pumping out one of these every single week.” Meet the new breed of property execs with the biggest TikTok profiles.
It’s no secret most people love to peek behind the door of fabulous homes, and Andrew Cumming has facilitated just that for millions.
Better known online as Brisbane Agent, with more than 50,000 TikTok followers, Cumming has marketed almost $150m in property throughout 2023 by crafting simple walk-through videos that capture the imaginations of viewers.
“There’s been $20m properties, $15m properties, the average price is $5m, and I’m pumping out one of these every single week,” says the agent, who works for Place Kangaroo Point. “Engagement wise, millions and millions of views, hundreds and thousands of likes and shares. The virality effect has been insane.”
More than 2.2 million people have explored Hill House, a sprawling property in the western suburb of Pullenvale that has its own equestrian ring alongside views of the city.
In Balmoral, to Brisbane’s east, a further 606,000 people have inspected a Hampton-style property called Grace as Cumming cartwheels in the backyard and stands on the edge of the pool with city views behind him. Both properties are still on the market.
“The fastest growing demographic on TikTok is your 40-plus year olds,” Cumming says. “The demographic who are in a position to buy is growing faster than any other demographic on the platform.
“Second to that, you’d be surprised how often kids will share a video with their parents. They know their parents are in the market looking for something … often that parent will come through an open home and reference the TikTok.”
More than 8.5m Australians use the Chinese-owned TikTok. In terms of time spent scrolling, Australians are also the biggest monthly consumers of content on the app, according to We Are Social’s 2023 report.
Cumming says it works. The 28-year-old eventual buyer of a seven-bedroom home on the edge of a golf course in Carindale, south of Brisbane, came from the video app.
Video is nothing new in the property world, with one in five listings on Realestate.com.au using it to sell homes.
But slickly produced video isn’t the forte of Melbourne agent at The Agency, Luke Saville, whose quickly filmed walk-through created a bidding war between two buyers for a one-bedroom apartment in Camberwell.
One was a 20-something from TikTok who was in the market, and the other a middle-aged woman from Instagram who had just stumbled across the post. The property eventually sold for $560,500.
“The lady who bought it wouldn’t have seen it because she wasn't planning to buy,” Saville says.
It’s not just agents, either.
Property valuers are often the behind-the-scenes expert number-crunchers, but Belinda Botzolis is bringing the profession to the forefront. The Melbourne-based valuer knows the job isn’t glamorous, but once she saw tax agents and accountants getting views from educational videos, she gave it a shot.
“I was so embarrassed, I didn’t put my name — I just had ‘The Valuer’ … because it’s an extremely professional and corporate career,” Botzolis says.
Now, almost 133,000 followers and 1.2m likes later, she has found her audience by offering renovation and design hacks to add value to properties, explaining economic concepts such as negative gearing as well as giving contract tips.
“I wanted to speak to people the way I’d want a mechanic or a doctor or surgeon to talk to me,” she adds. “A lot of people see property as numbers and graphs and facts and figures at the top, but right down the bottom is just human beings making a decision. I’m educating the everyday people because I feel like they don’t have any way to turn.”
The most popular video buyer’s advocate Emily Wallace has made it to the top explaining how a car stacker works, followed by one examining a property for potential underquoting. The Melbourne-based property professional and co-host of the My Millennial Property podcast makes about 60 per cent of her business from TikTok.
“It’s quite a big impact to be able to educate people that by chance come across your page and use information you give them to make better decisions,” Wallace says.
All agreed that it is about authenticity and understanding your audience and the idiosyncrasies of the platform.
Cumming says: “You have to engage with your community because that’s what fuels the growth.”
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