A doctor who gave up the medical profession to become a full-time property investor with her registered nurse daughter shares reno tips.
Opportunities abound for property investors armed with a $100,000 deposit, so where would the experts invest in today’s real estate market?
The Victorian GP-turned-investor has targeted Queensland’s Gold Coast for her new venture, with a Broadwater apartment purchased in January hitting the market after undergoing a stylish cosmetic renovation.
It is the second project Dr Lapascua has co-ordinated with her 25-year-old daughter, Hazel, a registered nurse, and goes to auction on March 23 with Coastal agent Karen Pirie.
Dr Mary Rose Lapascua
The two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment in the Atrium Resort at 1J/510 Marine Pde, Biggera Waters was sold vacant, allowing the new owners to complete the home makeover to a tight time frame. Interiors were upgraded with modern fixtures and on-trend finishes, including a Caesar stone benchtop with brass tapware in the kitchen and new timber-look vinyl flooring.
Building facilities include a rooftop pool and spacious shared entertaining terraces with spectacular views over the Broadwater. Residents and guests also have access to a second pool on the ground floor, as well as a gym, sauna, games room and cafe, and the unit has a secure car park.
It’s located just steps from the beautiful Broadwater
The rooftop pool and entertaining terrace
Property records show the unit was last listed to rent in 2020 at $410 per week.
Dr Lapascua, who worked in a family healthcare clinic in Torquay, Victoria until October 2023, said she was motivated to create wealth to share with charity, with the ultimate goal of providing shelter for homeless people in Melbourne and southeast Queensland.
“Our passion for property had been there for almost six years, and after we educated ourselves by attending various property seminars we decided the Gold Coast was the best area — it is really a hot market at the moment,” she said.
“In my heart, even if I was very active in the clinic, I was searching for ways I could help people who were on the streets and I would often do this incognito. My daughter and I would drop off donations to the churches that help the homeless.
“I surrendered my medical registration in December 2023 so I could be full-time with our property work. My daughter and I believe, if we have more, we can share more.”
The renovated Biggera Waters unit
It has two bedrooms and two bathrooms
Dr Lapascua, 53, said she had opted for the quick cash flow strategy of adding value through renovation rather than holding tenanted investments.
The mother-daughter team has a property portfolio spanning both Victoria and Queensland, and is looking at the WA market.
“We are interested in purchasing apartments, townhouses, and houses, to do cosmetic uplift to increase their values,” she said.
In 2023, the keen investors snapped up a unit in the Sandcastles resort building in Labrador.
They paid $505,000 for the apartment, then gave it a makeover in six weeks and onsold it for $690,000 after nine days on the market.
The unit they flipped at Labrador on the Gold Coast.
It sold for $690,000 after nine days on the market
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“It was tenanted when we bought it, so we first waited for the lease to expire then started the makeover and made arrangements with the property manager to help them find somewhere else to rent, because we knew it was hard to look for the rentals on the Gold Coast,” Dr Lapascua said.
“So I made sure the tenant was all right and then after renovating placed the property back on the market. The turnaround was less than six months.”
New data compiled by SuburbTrends shows 21.65 per cent of properties listed in Queensland in the first two months of 2024 were ex-rental homes.
Ready to call home at Biggera Waters
While NSW and Victoria notched up an increase, the percentage in Queensland was slightly down, reflecting robust investor activity in the Sunshine State.
Labrador recorded 29 landlord sales in January and February this year, Brisbane City 27, Hope Island 26 and Upper Coomera 24.
SuburbTrends found Kent Lardner said landlords were still seeing value in their investments despite high holding costs.
PropTrack data shows the price of a typical Biggera Waters unit increased 9.1 per cent over the past 12 months, to a median of $600,000.