A professional couple were leasing office space and paying someone else's mortgage. They wanted to buy their own commercial premises — somewhere they could run the business from, build equity, and take control of their occupancy costs long-term. The brief was straightforward: secure a well-located office in Brisbane's inner south that suited the business operationally, but also stacked up as a sound investment from day one.
We targeted office assets in established metro locations where rental demand was strong and vacancy was tight. The key was finding a property with short-dated leases sitting below market rent. That combination depresses the headline yield and makes the asset look less attractive to passive investors who want long WALE and set-and-forget income. For an owner-occupier, that's an opportunity, not a problem — short leases mean you can move in quickly, and under-market rent means the purchase price is anchored to the lower income. If the client could buy at that discounted price, then occupy the property themselves on a properly structured lease at true market rate, the valuation resets immediately. The gap between purchase price and re-valued figure was the equity play.
We identified a 397m² two-level office in Morningside — Brisbane's southern TradeCoast precinct, 5.5 kilometres from the CBD with strong connectivity to the Gateway Motorway and Brisbane Airport. The property sat at the front of a well-maintained strata complex with 15 exclusive car spaces. It was dual-tenanted across the ground and first floors, both leases expiring within months. Combined rent was sitting at around $112,000 per annum — roughly $282 per square metre, well below where the market was for comparable office space in the area.
We went in hard on the negotiation and used the soft rental profile as leverage. The numbers didn't justify a higher price based on what the property was earning at the time. We secured it at $1.9 million.
With both leases expiring shortly after settlement, the client moved in and established a new lease to themselves at $350 per square metre — in line with current market rent for the precinct. That shifted the property's income from roughly $112,000 to just under $139,000 per annum. Capitalised at a 6% yield on a solid lease with a quality tenant, the revised valuation came in at $2.325 million — an immediate equity uplift of $425,000 from the purchase price. The client went from paying rent to owning a two-level commercial office, occupying it on their own terms, and sitting on a significant paper gain before they'd even unpacked the boxes.
Start with a 15-minute discovery call. We'll talk through where you are, what you're working toward, and whether a deeper strategy meeting is the right next step.
Book a Discovery Call