Aspirational buyers line up

Mr Ward partly credited the growth to the increased numbers of properties being used as Airbnbs by investors and buyers from Victoria and NSW.

“Melbourne is a recurring name,” Mr Ward said.

“Some people are buying aspirational properties from down south.

The increased vigour of the Cairns real estate market matches predictions by real estate insiders of growth in the property market across the state after new numbers were released this week by number crunchers at the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The bureau’s figures show Queensland’s population will hit five million by May.

Cairns figures will be released next month.

“Queensland grew by 81,000 people last year, “said Real Estate Institute of Queensland chairman Rob Honeycombe.

“And we were the most popular state for internal migration, growing more than any other state in the year to September 2017.

“Last year, $54 billion of Queensland residential real estate was bought and sold.”