SHOW ME THE METERS - With Property - Size Really Matters...

Ok I realize from the get go that this a going to be a rant but it is a rant that needs to be made.

Buying a property is certainly one of  largest financial outlays in the life of any Australian.   The price of a 2 bed / 1 bath / 1 garage apartment is well over a million dollars most anywhere in the Planet Bondi footprint.  Even the prices of a tear down semi is well above 2 million and the price of a non attached property well over 3 million. I am talking minimums here of course.  Most properties are many more millions.  

So why do almost NONE of the real estate agents tell you one of the most important aspect of the property - its size in meters!!  It the case of an apartment I am talking about the internal square meters with or without external spaces.  In the case of attached properties or self standing properties I am talking the square meters of the land itself as well as internal and external spaces.

What is it about Australia that we sell properties based on bedrooms, bathrooms and garage spaces and do not prioritize the most basic metric of comparison - square meters.

Looking through the Wentworth Courier, the Planet Bondi Bible of property, here are the results in the order they appear in the Nov 3, 2021 edition:

Bradfield Cleary SHOW ME THE METERS

R&W SHOW ME THE METERS

The Agency METERS SHOWN - THE ONLY ONE…

Bresic Whitney SHOW ME THE METERS

Black Diamondz SHOW ME THE METERS

Sotheby’s SHOW ME THE METERS

Century 21 SHOW ME THE METERS

LJ Hooker SHOW ME THE METERS

Raine & Horne SHOW ME THE METERS

Laing & Simmons SHOW ME THE METERS

Ray White Double Bay SHOW ME THE METERS

Ray White TRG SHOW ME THE METERS

 

The Agency is the ONLY real estate agency that list the square meterage of a property as a matter of course. 

Yes I realise that some of the ads include the property size in the descriptions but many of the ads do not.  The issue here is that the size of the property is one of the most important metrics to compare one property to another property.  Why is this not front and center for everyone to see.

For properties that are self standing or attached ALL listings should show:

1 - Bedrooms

2 - Bathrooms

3 - Parking be it garage space, carport space or none of the above

4 - Pool - if there is one

5 - Square Meters of the LAND the property sits on

6 - Internal Living Space - defined as total floor space under cover

7 - External Living Space - defined as garages, patios & balconies

For apartments this should be exactly the same without the LAND metric

Why is this such a big ask?  Why is the most consequential financial purchase of anyone’s life so lacking in transparency?

In some cases you can find out size of the land by typing “for sale” and the address of the property into your search engine.  

However  only realestate.com.au routinely lists the land size in their profiles as domain.com.au does NOT.

Even when you go to the full listing of a property on an agents website there is often NO mention of the property size ANYWHERE in the listing:

Take for example 54 Nancy Street, North Bondi

https://raywhitedoublebay.com/properties/residential-for-sale/nsw/dover-heights-2030/house/2600932

If you go to the official listing at Ray White Double Bay you get lots of pretty pictures, a lovely video, floor plans, the fact that there are 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms and 1 garage space .  But NOWHERE is there any mention of the size of the land.  Yes, you can contact the agent to find out but why should anyone have to do this.  Why is the land size not front and center?

While the bedroom / bathroom / car spaces is certainly important it is NOT the most important measure of comparison.  You can have a 4/3/3 that sits on land of 350 meters and the same 4/3/3 on a property of 700 meters.  Why not save us all the hassle and just tell us up front so it is easier to compare one property to another.

To make this transition easier for all of the other agents, The Agency has already kindly created a perfect symbol to indicate property sizes as per above.

I call on all of the other agencies to follow their lead by adding the symbol and the critical SQM info to ALL of their listings which includes the Wentworth Courier, their own websites, all printed and internet advertising and anywhere else I may have omitted.  

It would also be lovely if agents would also include in their ads the internal SQM which is all internal living space under cover plus the external SQM which should be defined as patios, balconies and garages

Let’s up your game agents and give the buyers this critical information.  Let’s create a new standard which includes SQM of the land, internal and externals.

Is this too much to ask???