Up to a third of the 3000 holiday apartments in Port Douglas are for sale, with one unit recently fetching about $177,000 after selling for $366,000 six years ago, according to local agents.
Newly built units are flooding the market, with more than half of the apartments in the town's Lagoons@port development owned by failed property developer and pub baron Tom Hedley to be offered for sale by receiver Ernst & Young in coming weeks.
Phil Holloway, principal licensee of the Port Douglas Century 21 office, said he would put in a submission to receivers to market Mr Hedley's units.
"The last price received for one of the apartments was $345,000 and Hedley wasn't able to go below that because it wasn't economical," he said.
Similar units in the development would have normally sold for between $390,000 and $420,000, he said.
Receivers would have the units valued and then they were likely to be offered by auction or tender, he said.
"If they don't sell, the receiver can choose to sell them for a lower price than the valuation and chase the developer for the difference, or the lender has to decide it is going to lose money," he said. "It is big decision time for all of them."
The website for Ray White Port Douglas and Mossman said three-bedroom fully furnished apartments in Mr Hedley's Lagoons project were being offered at $375,000, down by $100,000 from the original asking price.
Nine of Mr Hedley's companies collapsed into receivership at the beginning of the month, including his construction and development business, owing ANZ Bank at least $200 million.
Hedley Group companies have built several complexes in over-developed Port Douglas in recent years, most of which have sold.
Receiver Justin Walsh, from Ernst & Young said 47 of the 92 units in the Lagoons development were available for sale and a formal marketing campaign would be launched in two to three weeks to sell them individually rather than in one line.
"We will be realistic," Mr Walsh said. "Obviously, we will sell them for what they are worth."
Mr Holloway said there were several hundred units for sale in Port Douglas.
"I would say to owners unless they need to sell, don't do it - hold on. The sellers out there at the moment are being punished," Mr Holloway said.
Queensland developer Shaun Juniper is this week launching heavily discounted subdivision land lots, according to agents in the area.
His company, the Juniper Group, is still to sell about five of the apartments in the luxury Coconut Grove development in the centre of town, comprising 33 apartments of three bedrooms each.
Mr Holloway said a villa at Juniper's Sea Temple development in Port Douglas recently sold for $1.3m, which was about 20 per cent less than the price many paid off the plan. "Some are reduced by 30 per cent," he said.
Mr Juniper did not return calls from The Australian about the projects.
Elsewhere in Port Douglas, the agent who sold a unit for $175,000 after it fetched $366,000 six years ago said this was the worst case of a price fall in the town.
He would not name the development where the unit sold, but said it was in the centre of town.
Agents say asking prices for most units have dropped by 15-20 per cent in the past 18 months.
Port Douglas's 3000 holiday units accommodate up to 9000 people in peak season, agents say.
Residential land developments are also suffering. Agents said about half of the 72 lots at a large residential subdivision at Cooya Beach, about 12 minutes north of Port Douglas, had sold.
It was possible to pick up a block of land for about $117,000, down from the previously asked $128,000 a year ago.
Mr Holloway said Juniper was launching lots for sale this week near the Sea Temple golf course, starting at $375,000, which was down about 40 per cent from the original asking price.
Juniper's house and land packages would also soon come up for sale overlooking the Sea Temple golf course, Mr Holloway said, starting at about $695,000, down from the original asking price of about $800,000 two years ago.
Queensland residential property analyst Bill Morris, author of the Midwood Queensland Investment Report, said there were almost no sales in new Port Douglas projects over the past quarter.
Units for sale in Port Douglas generally fetched more than $700,000 and anything in that price bracket in the state was struggling.
The strata market was highly volatile and speculative, he said. "It is overpriced and oversupplied," Mr Morris said. "It is a lovely place that does well in booms and badly in recessions."
