Off-Market Deals, Premium Pricing, Certainty: Hyperlocal Strategy Proves its Worth

As Victoria’s development market slows under pressure from rising costs, tighter regulations and weakening sentiment, many developers look to buy sites across multiple suburbs to maintain flexibility and deal flow. But two Melbourne developers are doing the opposite—and getting outstanding results. Oviss Group and Kincrest have built strong off-market pipelines by working only within single council areas. Both believe deep local knowledge beats spreading thin across many suburbs. Their strategy means vendors approach them directly, buyers refer other buyers and they achieve premium pricing well above suburb medians. Five-minute feasibility decisions Intimate street-level knowledge translates to immediate competitive edge for acquisitions, Oviss co-founder and director of construction Callan Tate tells The Urban Developer . When an agent calls Oviss Group about a potential site, the developer’s knowledge of Northcote and Alphington streets means they can assess value and feasibility before the call ends, often securing properties before competitors register the opportunity. “The agent tells us a street and within five minutes we’re able to say yes or no on it,” Tate says. “If we had spread out over four, five, six suburbs, we’d have to have a look and see different areas and pockets.” Across town at Essendon, Kincrest director Tom Howgate says vendors are now approaching the company directly after seeing its project The Watson sell out before completion. Howgate says his pipeline has been secured through reputation built within a single parochial suburb that locals describe as “a big country town”. Howgate’s boots-on-ground market test that first informed his Essendon entry was simple. “I walked down the main strip at Essendon North Village and, unlike Chapel Street at South Yarra or Bridge Road at Richmond, it had zero retail vacancy. That’s when I said it’s worth having a go at this area,” he tells The Urban Developer . ▲ Kincrest owner and managing director Tom Howgate: Boots-on-ground market test informed his entry into the Essendon market. Deals flow from direct relationships Oviss has a 500-property letterbox drop list across Northcote and Alphington, directly approaching owners about off-market sales. And it works—half the company’s current pipeline is off-market. Co-founder and director of acquisition Matthew Haywood says that building relationships with local agents also creates consistent deal flow. “We got seven off-market opportunities in the last couple of weeks of January,” he tells The Urban Developer . “That’s a culmination of talking to these agents for the past two or three years.” Haywood says working in one area allows them to understand exactly what buyers want in specific streets. “What someone wants at Toorak is different to what someone wants at Northcote,” Haywood says. “If we were looking at multiple suburbs, it’s near on impossible to know intimately what product suits each pocket.” That certainty translates to premium pricing. Oviss recently sold Lumen at Northcote for $4.25 million—achieving near-record per square metre rates—and against a $1.8 million median for the area. Building brand through repeat projects Designed by Rothelowman, The Watson’s 36 apartments sold out before completion, prompting Kincrest to acquire a site three doors down for Hollick Place , a 37-home project now progressing through Victoria’s Design Fast Track planning program. The Watson’s sales included friends of friends, colleagues and family buying alongside each other. None of the buyers are moving to the area without existing connections. “After doing The Watson, we were approached by other vendors in the area asking if we’d like to develop their site,” Howgate says. “Building good relationships with buyers sometimes means they introduce you to someone who has a site.” The developer’s pipeline of sites at Essendon and South Yarra is entirely off-market. ▲ Kincrest acquired the Hollick Place site (left) after The Watson (right) sold out, highlighting the developer’s the repeat-project strategy. Kincrest’s Prahran project achieved 50 per cent presales even before settling the land on a two-year settlement. It went on to complete more than 75 per cent presales. Howgate says sales have been across all price points from the $1.7-million entry-level apartments up to a $10-million sub-penthouse transaction. He says The Watson’s sell-out before completion shaped Carr’s design of the next project, Hollick Place, with apartment sizes increasing by 15 to 20sq m on average to 135sq m based on buyer feedback for larger bedrooms and living spaces. He attributes this to certainty around product-market fit. “We’re not guessing what apartments will sell for at Essendon,” Howgate says. “We’d already sold 36 of them at The Watson.” Personal approach builds trust Tate says personal branding has become central to Oviss’ marketing strategy in response to low industry trust levels. “People want to buy from people,” he says. “Gone are the days where people want to buy from a business.” Oviss provides all purchasers with both directors’ phone numbers and maintains contact long after settlement. This has also generated buyer referrals down the track. Both developers focus on selling to people who will live in the homes rather than investors, which has created stable sales. ▲ Oviss co-directors Callan Tate and Matthew Haywood. Howgate reports 100 per cent owner-occupier sales at Kincrest’s Essendon projects, while Oviss has had great success with buyers seeking long-term family homes. Focus matters more in difficult markets The owner-occupier focus reduces settlement risk compared to investor-heavy projects affected by lending restrictions, while established builder relationships provide pricing certainty as costs rise. “If it’s not an A-plus location, it doesn’t matter what you do in Victoria right now,” Howgate says. “It won’t get up.” Oviss plans to stick to the Northcote-Alphington area in the short-term, while Kincrest is looking at more opportunities in the broader Essendon area. “We have the first-mover advantage,” Howgate says. “We’ve got a really solid brand and think we can outpace any competition that comes on.” The area has enough buyer depth for projects ranging from five to 50 apartments if developers avoid flooding the market, he says. Consistent construction partners Both developers work with the same construction teams across projects. Kincrest has used Ireland Brown Construction (IBC) across six projects while Oviss maintains relationships with established trade partners. Howgate says repeat partnerships with IBC have been “one of the pieces of the puzzle which has helped us keep delivering product in a pretty shaky market”. The relationship saves time and builds trust, and the ongoing pipeline provides builders with certainty on pricing and priority allocation, he says. ▲ Lumen at 115 Roberts Street, Northcote, achieved $4.25 million against a $1.8-million suburb median. Premium payoff comes with high stakes The developers say the concentrated approach creates compounding benefits but demands constant discipline to protect what they’ve built. “We’ve seen it only takes one or two developments—you get them wrong and you’re cooked,” Tate says. “We understand where we’re at in terms of what our skill set is. We understand what we need to work on.” That self-awareness, applied to concentrated geography, explains why both developers reject opportunities outside their established areas despite consistent approaches from agents. And the model’s success has created its own momentum. The Watson buyers are asking for priority access to Hollick Place before launch. Vendors now approach both developers directly rather than listing through agents. The 50 per cent presales Kincrest achieved at The Osment before settling the land prove the commercial advantage of product-market fit certainty. Both developers believe this hyperlocal advantage matters more as markets tighten. “The market’s too shaky to roll the dice,” Howgate says. That discipline—combined with the deal flow, presales velocity and builder relationships that concentrated focus enables—has delivered what geographic diversification cannot in Victoria’s current environment. Knowing one market intimately rather than many markets superficially has proven more valuable than spreading risk across multiple suburbs.

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