Nostalgia-inducing Bribie Island beachside motel listed

Alistair WalshDecember 8, 2020

A beachside motel on Bribie Island has been listed for auction by a prominent Brisbane Liberal National Party activist.

The Surfside Shacks in Woorim reportedly started life as the Kin Kin hospital before it was carted to its current site by bullock dray and across the Pumicestone Passage by barge.

Ray White Bribie Island agent Shane Richards says the site is rich in history.

"The building was also used as a returned soldiers' respite hospital at the end of World War Two before becoming the Surfside Flats in the late 1950s, and it's been holiday accommodation ever since,” Richards told Caboolture News.

"It's been on the island for many years, and that makes it iconic because of how long it has been here, how many people would have stayed there and how close it is to the ocean."

Richards says generations of Bribie Island holiday makers from Queensland and interstate will have fond memories of their times spent at Woorim beach, on the doorstep of the property.

Bribie Island is in Moreton Bay near Stradbroke Island and Moreton Island.

Even he himself remembers holidaying here and says he has received interest from buyers overcome with nostalgia.

He says its proximity to the beach would be impossible under current planning laws.

"You could never build that close to the ocean again."

"Literally when you're on the top floor on the veranda, you can jump off onto the sand dune and roll down into the surf.

"If you took the building down you would have to have a six-metre setback for any new building, so essentially six metres back from the road.

"That's one thing that makes this property special, and the other aspect is its full-time return, so the money it's making."

The property is a two-storey building on 640 square metres with four units on the ground floor on residential leases and a three-bedroom, two-bathroom penthouse upstairs available for short-term accommodation or as a retreat for potential buyers.

Current rates for the penthouse start at $500 per week during off peak and up to $1,000 per week during the main season.

The downstairs units earn a gross income of around $56,000 per year.

The property has views over the recently weeded sand dunes through to the ocean.

It last sold for $950,000 in 2004. The vendor recently spent $700,000 renovating the place.

Richards was unwilling to give a price indication but said it would be unlikely to sell for less than $1.6 million.

It goes to auction on November 3.

The property is being sold by Brisbane-based property developer Daryl Fennell, who was a key figure in the creation of the merged Liberal National Party.

Fennell owns a number of properties in Queensland.

Alistair Walsh

Deutsche Welle online reporter

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