One Park Lane | Southport Gold Coast

The Gold Coast has overtaken Sydney on apartment values for the first time in history. For those already secured at One Park Lane, the market has arrived precisely where you positioned yourself — at its peak

Contracts: where things stand

Before the market update, an important note on where contracts sit.

Following the recent changes to the rules on SMSF borrowing for residential property, REIQ standard contracts for our SMSF buyers were executed over the weekend.

For our non-SMSF buyers, the One Park Lane contracts are receiving their finishing touches over the coming weeks. We anticipate opening the contracts process later this month.

With more than 100 clients currently holding reservations, contracts will be issued in a staged rollout rather than all at once, a deliberate approach that lets us give every purchaser the care the process deserves and keep things orderly. The order of issue is a matter of sequencing, not priority.

If you are holding a reservation, there is nothing you need to do right now. Your representative will contact you directly when your contract is ready and will walk you through each step.

Now, to the market your One Park Lane position sits within.

The coast that Australia once treated as a holiday postcode has quietly become the country’s most closely watched property market. Values are still climbing here while the southern capitals cool, and the reasons behind that shift are structural, not seasonal. This briefing is a short read on where the market sits today, and why One Park Lane is well placed within it.

A market that has decoupled from the south

Through late 2025 and into 2026, momentum in Sydney and Melbourne softened, with Sydney’s dwelling values easing back from their earlier peak. The Gold Coast moved the other way. In a genuine first for Australian real estate, the region’s median unit price climbed past Sydney’s, the coast now leads the nation on apartment values.

Ray White’s research arm put the Gold Coast unit median at roughly $956,000 against Sydney’s $927,000 — a milestone the firm’s chief economist attributes to migration, easing interest rates and a persistent shortage of new homes across south-east Queensland.

The supply side explains much of the strength. The Property Council has flagged that new apartment completions on the Coast could fall from around 1,900 in 2025 to roughly 1,400 in 2026, into a market where demand for high-end, off-the-plan stock remains well ahead of what is being built.

“An extraordinary milestone for a market once seen as an affordable coastal alternative.”

Where the market sits

$956k — Gold Coast median unit price, now ahead of Sydney’s $927k, a first for the market. (Ray White / Neoval, late 2025)
7–11% — Forecast dwelling growth across 2026, though analysts widely expect the pace to moderate. (SQM Research)
~1.2% — City-wide rental vacancy, among the tightest of any major Australian market. (Industry data, early 2026)
1,900 → 1,400 — Projected fall in annual apartment completions from 2025 to 2026 as supply tightens. (Property Council of Australia)

Equity, lifestyle, and a shift north

Behind the numbers is a change in how Australians live and work. High-earning professionals, executive families and downsizers are selling established homes in Sydney and Melbourne, unlocking substantial equity, and choosing the Coast. With hybrid work now embedded in executive culture, relocating no longer means trading down on career.

As one local analysis put it, the move is less about escaping southern prices than upgrading quality of life — buyers arriving with capital, selling multi-million-dollar homes down south, and choosing vertical living on the Coast. A subtropical climate, world-class beaches and a maturing dining and cultural scene make the case an easy one to put.

Infrastructure, and the Olympic decade

The Coast’s longer term story is underwritten by an unusually deep infrastructure pipeline, with Southport increasingly positioned as the region’s central business district.

The G:link light rail continues to connect Southport with Surfers Paradise and Broadbeach, and south-east Queensland is early into a decade of investment ahead of the 2032 Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games. Commentary on past host regions suggests the strongest gains often come during the build-up phase, as transport, venue and commercial investment lands, though, as with any forecast, that pattern is a guide rather than a guarantee. Alongside it, master-planned entertainment, medical and education precincts are turning Southport into a year-round urban centre.

One Park Lane: at the peak, by design

One Park Lane is not simply participating in this market, it is set to redefine the skyline above it. Designed by BKK Architects and refined for construction by Cottee Parker, the approved scheme pairs a 101-storey residential tower with a 60-storey commercial tower, linked by a fully glazed Level 22 skybridge of gardens, dining and function space, and delivering 193 residences.

At around 393 metres, the residential tower is set to become Australia’s tallest building — rising above the Q1 (322m) and Melbourne’s Australia 108. Conceived as a “vertical neighbourhood” of distinct residential communities, with sky decks, wellness levels and building-integrated solar façades, it answers to the same sophistication as Singapore or New York, on the Gold Coast. With early site works underway, purchasers are positioned inside a genuinely landmark address, well before completion.

393m — set to be Australia’s tallest building on completion
101 / 60 — residential and commercial towers
193 residences — across the residential tower
Level 22 — glazed skybridge linking the towers
Southport — Priority Development Area, the Coast’s emerging CBD