The real estate agents taking to TikTok to sell properties | A Current Affair #9ACA #ACurrentAffair

When the median house price in our capital cities is about a million dollars, owning a home is simply out of reach for many. But tiny one-bedroom studio apartments are proving an affordable way to get your foot on the property ladder and a roof over your head. Just how small though is too small. So how long is it? Five metres? Yeah, just over five metres. Internally, 19 square metres. So you step in... Yep. You're in the kitchen, you're in the bathroom. Yep, exactly right. A step left, you'd be in the bathroom. One step forward, living room. Yes, exactly right. Two more strides and you've covered it. It's compact living, all you want in four or five steps. It's teeny tiny apartment living with a price tag to match. The unit itself is $145,000 and for that you get one bed, one bathroom, small little living space and a balcony. Unless you're a student, I can't imagine anyone else being able to live in that. That's ridiculous, to be honest. I won't be able to live in there. For a single person, that's perfect. And more than a few others agree. So you've had 30 to 40 inquiries on this property? Yeah, that's just through socials. That's just through the Instagram and TikTok stuff. It's like you're travelling overseas but you're still in Melbourne. Eddie Fackrey and his son, Isaac, from Bill Schlink First National in Melbourne, put the property on social media before officially listing it. We're using Instagram and TikTok to sell houses. It's quick, it's easy, you can film a video in 20, 30 seconds, have it online later that day and get inquiries straight away. With mortgage repayments sitting at about $800 to $900 a month for this studio, paying off your own pad in Melbourne's mini city of Box Hill, about a 30 minute drive from the CBD has never been so affordable. The interest has varied from people wanting to live in it themselves, from people that are country based and are just wanting a little bit of a base around Melbourne. But the largest segment is investors, ultimately attracted to the just over 9% yield. I think this is at the coalface of what we know is happening in Australia. National property editor at Domain, Alice Stolls. I had reservations, I suppose, about how little light it had and how little functionality it had. The idea that you can sort of, you know, make a cup of tea, see the loo and your bed is kind of, you know, depressing. The studio only has room for a small bar fridge. The laundry is shared, but there is a communal living area and basement car park with a cage for extra storage. And body corporate is $2,400 a year. For many people, this is the only alternative that they have if they want to buy a property. It may be the changing face of the Aussie dream, but Alice says it's something we'll have to get used to. I think these smaller apartments are a sign of things to come in Australia. We don't have enough housing on the market and many developers are trying to push out housing as quickly as possible. As we say goodbye to the quarter block dream house, agents are ushering in a new way of doing business too. And it's thanks to a whole new generation of buyers. In six months, we've now sold eight properties purely off the back of TikTok and Instagram. Luke Saville and Sarah Maguire from the agency have been hashtag slaying it online. So we are getting potential vendors coming up to us asking if we can advertise on social media given the results that we are getting without having to spend the $20,000 on marketing. All of our inquiry, or the vast majority of it, comes through direct messages on those two platforms and people just don't want to speak over the phone anymore. It's all via text, direct message. The duo sold this two bedroom after one inspection, but their record is one hour. We saw it on TikTok, was there within about 15 minutes and had signed a contract within an hour. It's crazy. We just think it's been a real revelation. For vendors, it's a win-win. The game may be changing, but the desire for your own little patch only grows. I'd say open for inspection numbers this year have doubled comfortably. Should we all have a patch of grass? Absolutely. It's the dream, isn't it? So, congratulations!