The SEQ Development Brief
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The cost shock builders braced for has largely missed
Rider Levett Bucknall’s Construction Market Update for the June quarter, published 18 June 2026, found the Middle East conflict added 1.5 to 3.5% to total project costs, well short of the broad escalation the sector had priced. Diesel and plastic pipe prices rose 25 to 40% between February and June, and bitumen and asphalt 20 to 40%, but diesel has since fallen from its peak, shipping has stabilised, and several input surcharges have eased. Across most capital-city markets the immediate escalation risk has come down, not up.
RLB forecasts 2026 tender-price growth of 6.0% on the Gold Coast, alongside 7.0% in Townsville, 6.9% in Darwin, 5.6% in Perth and 5.1% in Adelaide, with Sydney and Melbourne at 4.0%. In Brisbane, delays to the Olympic and hospital programs have opened an estimated six-month window for shovel-ready projects, with competition strongest below about $80 million and Tier 1 capacity tightening ahead of Olympic venue work. The Australian Construction Industry Forum, cited in the report, now forecasts construction work to fall 0.8% across 2026, reversing an earlier call for about 2% growth.
For small operators this is a turn in the contract-mode calculus that ran through the first half of the year. The 82% anti-dumping duties on Chinese steel and the Strait of Hormuz freight risk that widened the cost stack earlier in 2026 have resolved milder than the worst case. A six-month window with stronger competition below $80 million is the moment to lock a builder and a price before Olympic venue work pulls Tier 1 capacity, and the sub-contract market with it. Fixed-price contingencies cut against the peak-escalation path can be re-tested against the softer outcome.
(Sources: Rider Levett Bucknall Construction Market Update, June quarter 2026, published 18 June 2026, via The Urban Developer and RLB Oceania.)
Building approvals carried the data week. The most-recent ABS Building Approvals print is April 2026, released 10 June. National total dwellings approved fell 3.4% on a seasonally adjusted basis to 16,710, after March’s 10.5% fall. Queensland ran the other way again, total dwellings up 0.3% to 3,946. The May print releases 1 July, after this issue.
The cash rate is unchanged at 4.35%, with the next Reserve Bank decision in August. The May monthly consumer price index releases on 24 June, the morning after this issue, so the most-recent released inflation read is the prior month’s; the May figure is flagged in On our radar rather than pre-empted here.
Rents stayed tight. SQM Research’s May vacancy print, released 15 June, held the national rate at 1.2%. Brisbane edged to 0.9% from 0.8%, about 3,124 dwellings on market, with combined rents up 0.8% for the month and 9.1% over the year. Cotality’s May Home Value Index, the most-recent released values read, was flat nationally at 0.0% with Brisbane holding at +0.9%. The June index is due about 1 July.
Brisbane
Stockwell unveiled a 15-year masterplan on 9 June for the Kurilpa peninsula in South Brisbane, built on the former Parmalat and Pauls Milk factory sites it has consolidated along Montague Road. The vision runs to about 12 residential towers, a 400-room hotel and close to 200 food, drink and entertainment venues across a holding of more than five hectares, with a Brisbane 2032 legacy precinct on the river. A first-stage development application is lodged with Economic Development Queensland for a 30-storey, 299-apartment owner-occupier tower at 108 Montague Road, on the corner of Boundary Street.
The site sits inside the Montague Road provisional priority development area, so Economic Development Queensland, not Brisbane City Council, is the assessment manager. Public notification on the separate four-site Land Activation Program priority development area, which covers a state parcel further along Montague Road, closed 19 June, and Economic Development Queensland is now assessing submissions before it finalises the land-use plan. Between the two, much of the South Brisbane riverbank is now assessed by the state rather than the council.
On the small-lot side, Brisbane City Council’s More Homes, Sooner amendment to the low-medium density residential zone would cut the minimum lot size for small-lot houses toward 120 square metres, set 400 square metres for dual occupancies, and lift heights to three storeys, four near frequent transport and centres. Consultation closed 20 March and the council has not yet adopted it; on adoption it widens what a small operator can build on an ordinary infill block. (Sources: Brisbane City Council, More Homes, Sooner; The Urban Developer.)
Gold Coast
The City of Gold Coast approved the $1 billion redevelopment of the Benowa Gardens shopping centre in an 8-7 full-council vote in early June, clearing a trio of towers with 413 apartments over a supermarket, specialty retail and a health and wellness precinct. More than 550 submissions opposed it and an appeal has been flagged, so the approval is not yet settled. Smaller stock is moving too: construction on Bronze on Chevron, 119 apartments on Chevron Island, is set to start in July. (Sources: The Urban Developer, 3 June 2026; Business News Australia.)
Sunshine Coast
The draft new Sunshine Coast planning scheme, still in assessment after about 4,600 submissions to a consultation that closed 19 September 2025, would make dual occupancy accepted development throughout the Low-Density Residential Zone where it meets the scheme’s new requirements, replacing today’s restrictions in particular parts of that zone. It also introduces a Dwelling House (Small Lot) Code for lots under 450 square metres and provides for secondary dwellings and terrace houses in suburban areas. For a small operator the read is a wider band of suburban sites where a compliant duplex or second dwelling can proceed as accepted development, without the impact-assessable application those sites can require today. The council expects its review to run well into 2026, with a consultation report to follow. (Sources: Sunshine Coast Council proposed planning scheme, Have Your Say; Milne Legal.)
Moreton Bay
A $6 million, three-kilometre waterside walking circuit opened on 20 June at Moreton Bay Central, the former Petrie paper-mill priority development area now anchored by the University of the Sunshine Coast campus. The public-realm work doubles as Games-time amenity for the Moreton Bay Indoor Sports Centre. Further north, community submissions on the Waraba priority development area, the 25,000-home greenfield city at Caboolture, close 2 July. (Sources: City of Moreton Bay; Moreton Daily.)
The cost shock that didn’t land.
RLB’s June-quarter update puts the Middle East conflict’s hit at 1.5 to 3.5% of project cost, with diesel off its peak and shipping stabilised. The contract-mode caution that ran from January was the right risk to carry, but the realised outcome sits at the soft end. Fixed-price contingencies written against the worst-case materials path can be re-tested now, before they harden into tenders that no longer need them.
A six-month window under $80 million.
RLB flags an estimated six-month opening for shovel-ready Brisbane projects while the Olympic and hospital programs slip, with competition strongest below about $80 million and Tier 1 capacity tightening into Olympic venue work. For small operators that is the procurement window: the capacity competing for sub-$80 million jobs today moves to Games venues next year, and the price moves with it.
The build pipeline is set to shrink, not grow.
The Australian Construction Industry Forum now reads construction work down 0.8% across 2026, against an earlier call for roughly 2% growth. A contracting pipeline into a Brisbane rental market under 1% vacancy keeps completions behind demand. Less building, not more, is the structural floor under SEQ rents through 2027.
Private capital is mapping onto the state’s PDA lines.
Stockwell’s 12-tower Kurilpa masterplan and its first 299-apartment tower both sit inside the Montague Road provisional PDA, the same fast-track footprint the state has been extending across South Brisbane. The pattern worth tracking is private masterplans forming where the state has taken assessment in-house, because that is where approval moves fastest and where the density benchmark gets set for adjacent sites.
Councils are lowering the floor for small-lot product.
Brisbane’s More Homes, Sooner amendment would take small-lot houses toward a 120-square-metre minimum and dual occupancies to 400, and the draft Sunshine Coast scheme would make dual occupancy accepted development across its Low-Density Residential Zone. Stack that on secondary-dwelling rules that already allow a rentable second home as accepted development on many 400-square-metre lots, and the small-operator lane is widening while the majors chase towers. The sites that benefit are ordinary suburban blocks, not the riverfront parcels in Big moves.
The inflation print lands the morning after.
The May monthly consumer price index releases on 24 June, the day after this issue, and feeds straight into the August rate decision the banks are split on. A firm print revives the hike case Westpac is already carrying; a soft one supports the cut the other three majors read. Presales settlement-risk passes should hold both paths open until the number is out.
The approvals layer is where Australian housing supply gets stuck, and this is the quarter governments started wiring AI into it. In the federal budget handed down in May, the Commonwealth committed more than $500 million to implement its rewrite of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, including $105.9 million to improve access to environmental information and unlock AI-enabled systems and data for the people lodging projects (Property Buzz, 11 May 2026; HIA, 11 May 2026). The pitch is better data and digital tools producing faster, clearer and more consistent environmental decisions. The same budget papers note the EPBC housing strike team has cleared more than 20,000 homes since August 2024, which is the benchmark the AI tooling is meant to lift.
The states are further down this road than the Commonwealth. New South Wales went to tender in September 2025 for an AI solution to support State Significant Development assessments, the pathway that currently averages about 8.5 months end to end with roughly three of those months in government hands (NSW Government, 1 September 2025). The tool is built to review documentation before lodgement, test applications against planning rules, and flag missing or non-compliant data, with the final decision still required to be made by a person. South Australia has gone first on the simple end: its Automated Decision-Making pilot assesses applications for detached houses in master-planned neighbourhoods in minutes, against a current average of 9.5 business days, by focusing on the accepted and deemed-to-satisfy applications that carry no discretion (Australian Property Investor, 2 October 2025).
Where this lands for SEQ
Queensland has not announced an equivalent, but the read for a SEQ developer is not about waiting for one. The EPBC reform is national, so the federal approval that gates greenfield work like Waraba and Caboolture West sits inside the system getting the AI money. And the pattern the states are proving out, machine assessment of the code-assessable and accepted-development end while humans keep the discretionary calls, maps almost exactly onto the small-lot and duplex product this issue keeps returning to. The reforms widening what counts as accepted development across Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast are the same applications a system like South Australia’s clears in minutes. The compliance lane and the automation lane are converging, and the operator who builds to the code rather than fighting for discretion is the one who benefits from both. Worth watching whether Queensland’s next planning update names AI at all.
26 June 2026: Aura Central locality boundary consultation closes (Caloundra South PDA).
30 June 2026: Queensland $30,000 First Home Owner Grant sunset; reverts to $15,000 for new-build contracts signed from 1 July.
1 July 2026: ABS Building Approvals May release.
1 July 2026 (approx): Cotality June Home Value Index release.
2 July 2026: Waraba PDA Development Scheme community submissions close.
July 2026: Queensland Residential Activation Fund Round 2 announcements expected ($500 million pool; applications closed 24 April).
Late July 2026: Stockland Twin Waters first release (17 homesites), Sunshine Coast coastal-amenity land pricing signal.
August 2026: RBA Monetary Policy Board next decision; major banks split between a cut and a further hike.
August 2026: APRA Q1 2026 quarterly ADI Property Exposures release.
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The SEQ Development Brief lands Tuesday mornings — the big residential development moves across South-East Queensland's twelve councils, plus the occasional update on what we're building. Free.