🏘️ Townhouses, pipelines and a $1.98m FaceTime sale

GOOD MORNING FROM ELITE AGENT 👋

TODAY'S FEATURE

Why top agents guard their pipeline like gold

Most agents celebrate a closed deal, then scramble to find the next one. The top 10% of commercial agents never make that mistake – they're tracking their pipeline by source, stage and probability while everyone else is still popping champagne. Darren Krakowiak has spent enough time around elite performers to spot the habits separating them from the pack, and none of it comes down to talent.

What you'll learn in the full article:

• The pipeline-as-asset mindset: why treating your pipeline like your most valuable asset changes how you prioritise every week.
• The no-pause prospecting rule: what happens when you keep prospecting during your busiest month, not just your quietest one.
• The niche-or-nothing pitch: how narrowing your focus to one area or asset class builds trust faster than trying to be everywhere at once.

Read the full article →

TOGETHER WITH BUYERSAGENTS.COM.AU

BuyersagentsOS launches single-subscription operating system for buyers agents.

If you're a buyers' agent, you know the tabs. CRM in one, compliance in another, property data in a third, marketing somewhere else entirely, and a client waiting on all of it.

BuyersagentsOS, launched by Buyersagents.com.au on 14 September 2026, folds 18 of those separate products into one monthly subscription, with Cotality's RP Data Premium and Pro built straight into the workflow so property reports and comparable sales sit alongside your pipeline rather than in a browser tab you have to go hunting for.

There's a seven-day free trial running now, with pricing scaled for solo operators through to enterprise teams. Take a look at what's included over at BuyersAgents.com.au.

Learn more →

DEPT OF PROPERTY MANAGEMENT

Every KPI has to be something a client receives

Four years into reshaping their Melbourne property management business, Pat McConnachie and Jacinta Jackson of Ray White Ferntree Gully told PM/ONE the test they apply to every change is what the client gets out of it. In 2023 the team voted in its own leadership group, replacing one picked by management. Every KPI now ties to a service an owner receives, more outbound calls to owners have meant fewer incoming ones, and a software audit found capability they were paying for and not using. Pat's advice on change: anticipate the effects, explain the why, and involve the team – "one of us isn't as smart as all of us".

Read the full article →

DEPT OF HOUSING

Townhouses close the affordability gap houses can't

Canberra's inner-ring house buyers are searching $538,000 below what's actually listed – the biggest seller premium of any capital, per Domain's latest Matching Demand Report. Townhouses tell a different story: Sydney's inner ring flipped from a $200,000 seller premium to a $100,000 buyer premium in just a year.

Nicola Powell's take: the trade-off buyers are making isn't location anymore, it's dwelling type.

DEPT OF WEALTHY CLIENTS

Branded residences set to double again by 2031

Global branded residences have almost tripled in a decade – from 354 schemes in 2015 to 903 now – and Knight Frank expects another doubling within five years. Australia's barely scratched the surface, but 60% of local projects in the pipeline sit in Queensland, with Sydney, Brisbane and the Gold Coast tipped to lead the next wave.

HOW IT SOLD

Buyers bought a house they'd never entered

An interstate family purchased Belinda Turner's Reedy Creek listing for $1,987,500 without a single in-person inspection. Belinda ran live FaceTime walkthroughs, including a two-hour session during the building and pest inspection, to get them across every detail remotely.

Find out the story behind how it sold →

Google calls it E-E-A-T. Agents call it being written about. getailsa.com →

MOVERS & SHAKERS

LJ Hooker's marketing overhaul lifts local leads by 85%

Stephan Gervois, LJ Hooker's general manager of marketing, has taken the network's brand campaign, The Difference, to a win in the Acquisition Marketing category at the 2026 Australian Marketing Institute Awards – the only real estate company recognised this year. Under his watch, the campaign has driven an 85% jump in sales appraisal leads reaching local offices, with Stephan crediting the network's marketing team, its offices and agency partners Überbrand and Reload Media.

From associate to agent: Kenji Fukushima steps out on his own Twelve years after starting Saturday opens for Alexander Phillips, Kenji Fukushima is now a standalone agent with his own associate, James Brady, as part of the founding team at newly launched Ray White Phillips & Co. A lifelong Waverley local with a Bachelor of Business and a Diploma in Property Services, he's built a client base across Sydney's eastern suburbs on repeat business and referrals rather than one-off sales.

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This is a great industry for women… if you can take a “no” and come back louder 💅🔥

TRUE OR FALSE:

Cadbury built an entire village for its chocolate workers in Birmingham – and in 130 years, nobody has ever been allowed to open a pub in it.

And the answer is …

True. George Cadbury started Bournville in 1895 and, being a teetotal Quaker, wrote alcohol out of the place entirely – a by-law with more staying power than any strata committee. Still not one pub, 130 years on. The closest it came was 2015, when the local newsagent won a licence to sell a few beers: residents backed him, one councillor called it "catastrophic", and the village stayed pub-free. via TheJournal.ie (AFP).