It used to be cable TV and fast internet, but now homebuyers looking to secure property within Breakfast Point want to be able to charge up their electric vehicles (EVs) onsite.
Local property specialist Cilla Green said rising fuel prices have coincided with a sharp increase in the number of people enquiring about the availability of EV chargers within the community.
She believes better access to chargers will benefit everyone – even those without plans to ever purchase an eco-friendly EV car.
“Around a third of our general enquiries for our upper-end properties are asking about electric-vehicle charging,” said Ms Green, who works at Breakfast Point Realty.
“Charging stations will absolutely make properties more appealing and there is no doubt in my mind that Breakfast Point will need a hub available to the community.”
One of the difficulties is that every apartment complex is different in the way it can provide access to charging stations. In addition, irrespective of installation requirements, all strata schemes need to set by-laws according to the needs of their building.
As momentum builds for EV vehicles, Ms Green believes homebuyer expectations will demand access to charging stations in premium communities such as Breakfast Point.
“We’ve seen this before with things such as Foxtel iQ or the NBN. It was ignored to a degree, but then people realised that purchasers were looking outside of Breakfast Point if it wasn’t available to them,” she said.
From October 2023, it will be mandatory for new apartments in Australia to be built with the infrastructure to allow EVs to be charged onsite.
However, while most people are enthusiastic about caring for the environment, not everyone is happy about paying for charging station access points to be retrofitted to an existing building if they do not drive an EV.
But Ms Green describes this as a ”weightless” argument, saying there are many facilities within Breakfast Point that are not utilised by all residents.
The Breakfast Point EV team was formed two years ago to investigate the challenges and solutions for installation. The idea is not to add a charger to every parking bay, but rather to provide a framework allowing lot owners to connect when they are ready.
Owners then pay for cabling from the common infrastructure that utilises a building’s spare electrical capacity.
Residents living within the Admiralty complex already have an individual metered power source close to parking bays allowing chargers to be fitted, if desired. Framework for EV charging has been installed at Celeste, which has been taken up by some lot owners. Other buildings are working towards providing access.
EV driver Jason Heskett lives in the Burgundy Hill complex where a subcommittee has just been formed to investigate EV charging options. Jason currently relies on public charging stations and believes enabling charging points at home is a worthwhile investment for strata and will ultimately benefit everyone.
“When I first started driving an EV, I could go down to the charging station at Rhodes and pretty much be guaranteed a spot,” he said. “Over the past three years, EVs have become much more popular and most of the time it [the charging station] is full.
“EV charging is worth installing. If nothing else, you are protecting property values – even if you don’t intend to drive an EV. ”
For more information, go to
ev.breakfastpoint.info/