We’ve helped hundreds of clients of all shapes and sizes on their property journey, with projects ranging from investment property purchases and renovations to expats returning to Australia looking for their ultimate family home. Below we’ve handpicked a small selection of those projects to help you better understand the services we offer.

Investment purchase

Adelaide’s south is quickly becoming a popular destination for all kinds of buyers, particularly young owner-occupiers. Given the signs of gentrification the region is showing, coupled with its excellent access to Adelaide’s CBD, it’s easy to see why.

We were fortunate enough to help an Australia-based client get into the southern Adelaide market. We purchased a property that offers an excellent return-on-investment both now and into the future.

The home is a 1970s low-set brick build on a generous 660sqm block. Combined with its ample living space – three bedrooms, one bathroom, a sizeable lounge area and space for two cars – and proximity to good schools, it’s the ideal property for a young or growing family. Equally, the home offers great access to the rest of Adelaide, including the city centre and beaches.

We purchased the property for c. $450,000 in May 2022 via a private treaty, and our client undertook minor pre-lease maintenance, keeping the overall budget in line with their brief. 

So, given this will be an investment property, what’s in it for our clients?

The home offers a rental yield of 5.3%, which is a very decent return, making it positively geared, and because the area is still in a period of rapid growth, its value will increase substantially over time.

It’s a result we’re really happy with, and our clients are, too.

Structural renovation

When we purchased this incredible penthouse in the inner-Sydney suburb of Woolloomooloo, we knew we’d bought a winner. First, there are two penthouses in the block. When we missed out on the first one at auction, we canvassed the neighbour and purchased this home off-market. Fortunately, we secured it at a considerably lower price than the next-door neighbour’s action result. Plus, not only is the apartment located in one of our favourite city-fringe enclaves, but it also offers sublime views over the CBD, including the Harbour Bridge.

Despite its numerous assets, we realised there was a lot of work to do to improve the apartment’s interior and help it match the quality of its location. To that end, we undertook a 65-week structural renovation to give the penthouse a significant upgrade.

Our mission was to capitalise on the stunning views of Sydney Harbour and the city skyline, to design a home prime for entertaining friends and family, and to create a great space where our client could work from home. To meet both objectives, we completely transformed the floorplan to create a functional and open space that offers views from most rooms and has ample space for guests.

We also completed a cosmetic uplift, including an overhaul of the current bathrooms and kitchen, and gave the apartment a neutral palette. Across every room of the penthouse, there are white walls and light oak timber floors paired with black and copper accents to provide a dynamic contrast.

However, the project was not without its challenges. First of all, we faced many of the traditional hurdles associated with a typical strata scheme approval and full development application. On top of those, the NSW Government introduced new regulations on renovating multi-storey residential buildings prior to the project entering the construction phase.

As a result, all designs needed to be declared for compliance with the Building Code of Australia and logged on the NSW Planning Portal, then, the project had to be built in accordance with those designs. Our team underwent a great deal of due diligence to make sure all practitioners were registered to work on the project and that we were following the new processes put in play.

As well, we kicked off during the peak of COVID-19, where we saw the full impact of the enormous material delays and labor shortages the industry is facing. This is a challenge we’re still dealing with today, however, with the help of our reliable trade base and suppliers, we have managed to navigate this very successfully.

In total, the project was split across 30-weeks of planning and design and 35 weeks of construction. At the end, the space was turned into something entirely more functional, and the overall liveability of the apartment was massively improved.

On top of giving our client a beautiful home, the project has also come with some significant financial windfalls. Unsurprisingly, our client is loving their new home and the opportunities it could open up in the future.

Game Plan

With an initial investment of $120,000 over the first 12-months, our client’s goal and objective were to build a property portfolio that was able to deliver a passive income in retirement (circa ~20 years).

Milk Chocolate advised accumulating five properties across multiple states and territories around Australia to keep our client’s portfolios diverse and to minimise their risk and exposure.

We recommended the first purchase be an apartment in Canberra. The aim here was to have a high rental yield which would increase cash flow to procure the other properties faster. Capital growth was not the main priority. We progressed and purchased the asset in April 2018 in the highly gentrifying area of the Inner South for $372,000, now valued at $460,000*, with the property achieving a current rental yield of 5.88%. 

Using the cash flow from the Braddon property, we were then able to progress and purchase the second property in the Game Plan: a house on a decent-sized block of land in a high-growth area in Brisbane. In February 2019, we purchased a traditional Queenslander in the north-western suburbs for $595,000, which was valued at $850,000*, a gross return of 12.37% p.a. The property is currently bringing in $575 a week, or a rental yield of 3.52%, for a total return of 15.88% YoY. 

Thanks to the strong performance of the first two assets we procured, we were able to move forward and purchase the third property in February 2020: another house in a high-growth area, but this time in Adelaide. After a purchase price of $644,900, this property was recently valued at $780,000* – a result, the home has seen an increase of 20.95 percent in just under 18-months. Not a bad result at all. 

To achieve our client's goals, we recommended a further two purchases, the first in 2023 and the final in 2028, in locations to be identified closer to the proposed purchasing date. When it comes time to execute that purchase, we’ll be taking into account the ebbs and flows of the property market and identifying potential new areas that present strong growth prospects.

We also recommended our client sell two of the properties in 2033 in order to start achieving a passive income of circa $70,000 pa, with the funds from the sales sitting across the existing offset accounts.

By 2043, if our client decides to sell down the portfolio, we modelled an assumed cash surplus position just shy of $5 million, equating to roughly 20 years’ worth of living expenses at $245,000 pa.

*All valuations are as per Q2 2022

Family home purchase

Earlier last year, we worked with our Qatar-based clients to buy a beautiful pre-1946 Queenslander in the northern Brisbane suburb of Banyo. Our goal was to find them the ideal family home for when they move back to Australia in 2023.

The home is a blend of old and new, with plenty of respect given to its heritage while also being beautifully renovated. The previous owners raised the house to increase space and functionality and undertook a significant renovation to make the home more liveable by contemporary standards. 

Now, flooded with natural light, featuring high-quality finishes and sporting a welcoming open plan, this might just be one of our favourite Brisbane homes ever.

But what makes this particular purchase unique is that it strikes the perfect balance between finding our clients their dream home and ensuring the property pulls its weight as an investment.

We picked Banyo partly because it has all the hallmarks of a suburb poised for significant growth. In fact, the area has already experienced a price boost over the past year. In the 12 months to now, Banyo’s median house price has increased by a very impressive 25.6%. 

Plus, before they come home, our clients will be renting out the property – meaning they can also enjoy a bit of passive income ahead of their return.

Property management

Melbourne’s inner-western suburbs are currently in hot demand across both purchases and rentals. Recently, we worked with a client who lives in Hong Kong to help them procure an investment property right in the centre of the inner west.

The home is the quintessential Milk Chocolate property: it’s a character dwelling oozing with personality and potential, it sports a high-quality renovation, and it’s located in an in-demand area. Naturally, when we leased it out, there was huge demand among prospective tenants.

After settling on the Thursday, we held an open home the following Saturday. We subsequently received four applications and had people begging us – literally – for their applications to be approved. We then leased the home on the following Wednesday for $30 per week above market rate, which our Hong Kong client was obviously very happy with.

Commercial property

For various reasons, there will be clients looking for a higher yield, and at times we will purchase commercial property. Commercial property is real estate that is used for business activities and usually refers to buildings that house businesses, This purchase was in the ACT, a cafe that is currently on a long-term lease by a cooking college yielding 9.94%.