Meet the neighbours before you buy: The real estate portal taking buyers behind the scenes
Co-founder of Homely, Jason Spencer, discusses how his own experience of a failed property purchase led to a lightbulb moment, and the birth of a new property platform
5 min
Jason Spencer is passionate about technology, but not for the sake of it. Instead, Spencer’s focus is the kind of ‘life changing’ technologies that make a difference in the way we live and do business. His most recent obsession is Homely, a real estate platform with a difference, offering reviews of suburbs and streets — by the people who live there. Founded with Adam Spencer, it’s the kind of game changer Jason wished was around when he was on his home buying journey, tapping into a desire from buyers to take a deep dive before purchasing, as well as giving locals the opportunity to share what they love about their area. The Homely story starts with a very personal experience, as Jason Spencer explains.
Kanebridge News: The Homely story comes out of your personal experience of moving to a suburb in inner Melbourne. What happened? Why did you hate it?
Jason Spencer: Homely was created out of my own frustrations with real estate. After buying my home in a nice leafy suburb in Melbourne, I quickly realised that the street wasn’t for me. Almost immediately after we moved in, we had all sorts of issues. First it was the neighbours, who we didn’t get along with, then it was the cut-through traffic and noise, the flooding and — the final straw—the swarms of bats that flew over our house each night, settling in our backyard! One night I remember saying to my co-founder, “If only I knew about this street before I bought the house”. And that was the lightbulb moment. That was when Homely was born.
KN: What would you have liked to have known before buying?
JS: The inspiration for Homely was the truth that “finding the right neighbourhood is just as important as finding the right home.” I’d like to have known what the locals thought, not just of suburbs but of individual streets as well. Before Homely, the majority of people would rely on generic suburb information available on Google and if lucky they’d find a static local guide page, census data or Wikipedia entry. To address this gap, we established a forum and community where real locals could openly share their experiences, insights, and history about their streets, suburbs, and towns. This kind of information is invaluable for making an informed decision about property, especially considering it’s one of the most significant decisions someone can make.
KN: Did you move? If so, what did you do differently the next time you were in the property market?
JS: Yes I did. I moved to something a little further out from the city but with more land and a bigger home for a similar price. This time, I did a lot more research on Homely and by asking locals what they thought. People were more than happy to share what they loved about their home suburb and streets, which is why we have the wealth of content on Homely we do.
KN: How did that personal experience spur you and Adam on to found Homely?
JS: For most of us, finding a home is one of the most difficult and stressful decisions we can make. As founders, we felt the combination of useful local information written by those that live in the neighbourhood combined with the access and utility of a real estate portal would make for a very unique way to find a home online. We wanted to create for real estate what sites like TripAdvisor had done to travel.
KN: You’re starting to build a substantial database of suburb reviews now. Where are the reviewers drawn from?
JS: Our reviews come from all over Australia. When we launched the site, we received some great media coverage, which generated an initial base of content. This encouraged locals to have their say about areas they knew well, which in turn created a sense of community on the Homely platform that grew, along with relevant property listings from all over Australia. We have seen some intense debate about suburbs, which is always interesting!
KN: What has surprised you, if anything, about the reviews?
JS: The amount of information (and passion) that locals are prepared to share about where they live. People love to talk about the great schools in a suburb, the best restaurants and shopping. Of course, crime and safety are always hot topics.
KN: What can a review on Homely give a buyer that a visit to a suburb cannot?
JS: Homely gives you immediate access to reach out to a community and unlock secrets and truths about the neighbourhood that you just can’t do easily by visiting the suburb. You can also ask questions and join local forums. We’ve had feedback that Homely reviews have saved people time and money, as they’ve been able to refine their property search and time spent on inspections.
KN: How specific can reviews get? Is it possible to read a street review?
JS: We pride ourselves on being the first in Australia to offer reviews down to the street level, delivering “hyperlocal” content that even includes vendors reviewing their own streets to give potential buyers a sense of what drew them to the area initially.
KN: What have buyers said about the value of the reviews?
JS: Buyers consistently tell us that Homely is a great starting point to the home buying journey. Whether they’re investors seeking information to bolster their decisions, or families searching for the perfect suburb, Homely reviews often serve as a first stop, offering valuable information they can’t get anywhere else. We find many buyers land on our street and suburb reviews via Google after searching for a specific location. While reviews can be diverse it’s the nuggets of information contained within the reviews that really help buyers.
KN: You’ve been in property for 25 years. What still excites you about the residential market?
JS: The untapped opportunities for innovation in the proptech space and the property seeking journey are what excites me most. From the birth of the first property websites in the early 2000s, to the innovations that Web 2.0 and Google Maps brought to portals in 2007, to the role of smartphone technology in the search experience, I’m now very excited to be a part of how AI and blockchain can enhance the home search experience.
KN: What’s next for Homely?
JS: We have a strong pipeline of innovations to make the home search experience better for every consumer. We are looking forward to a big 2024 with an increase in residential listings hitting the market and a forecast record number of home buyers and renters looking on Homely to discover their next perfect place to call home.
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3 min
Australia’s housing crisis will not be solved by first-home buyer incentives or tax changes alone, with leading property figures warning governments must tackle supply constraints if affordability is to improve.
Speaking at the Kanebridge Quarterly Property Leadership Summit in Sydney last week, expert project marketing specialist Sam Elbanna, property investor and fund manager Paul Miron and property consultant Karla McNeice said that a lack of housing supply remained the central issue facing the market.
Elbanna, Director of CPM Realty with more than 30 years’ experience in project sales, argued that successive governments had focused too heavily on stimulating demand rather than addressing the barriers preventing new housing from being delivered.
“The misconception is that politicians think the way to solve the housing crisis is to drive demand,” he said.
“The reality is that’s not the way. This is a supply-side problem, and it needs to be solved on the supply side.”
Drawing on his experience in project sales, Elbanna said policies designed to help first-home buyers often had unintended consequences, pointing to previous grants that ultimately flowed through to higher property prices.
Instead, he said developers were facing increasing red tape, approval delays and rising costs, which were discouraging new housing supply.
“In the absence of stock, demand exceeds supply,” he said.
Miron, a Co-Founder and Fund Manager of Msquared Capital, said the housing debate had become overly focused on tax policy while overlooking broader structural issues.
He argued that affordability challenges stemmed from a combination of factors, including planning constraints, supply shortages, migration levels and interest rates.
“No-one can be 100 per cent certain on the real reason for property prices is going up,” he said.
“The reason why property prices are higher is a combination of interest rates, lack of supply, migration, vacancy rates and maybe taxes play a role.”
Miron was critical of recent federal housing policy changes, warning they could reduce the number of new homes being built and further constrain supply that was even highlighted in the budget.
He also highlighted the importance of the property sector to the broader economy, noting that residential real estate and related industries employed more than one million Australians.
McNeice, who advises developers on sales strategy and market intelligence, said understanding buyers had become increasingly important as affordability pressures intensified.
While affordability remained a major consideration, she said today’s buyers were focused on value rather than simply price.
“People are looking for value for money,” she said.
She said buyers were increasingly evaluating factors such as transport connections, walkability, nearby amenities and flexible living spaces that could accommodate changing family needs.
“What infrastructure is going on? Can I walk to the shops? Can I meet people at the local cafe?” she said.
The panel also discussed the mounting pressures facing developers, with Elbanna arguing that many projects become financially unviable from the moment a site is purchased.
“The viability of a development happens at the moment the site is bought,” he said.
He said rising construction costs, higher interest rates and overly optimistic feasibility assumptions had left some developers exposed as market conditions changed.
While acknowledging the growing number of smaller and first-time developers entering the market, Elbanna said property development required expertise across finance, construction, marketing and legal disciplines.
“It is actually a business that requires a level of expertise,” he said.
Looking ahead, the panel agreed opportunities remained in the market despite current challenges.
Miron said property should continue to be viewed as a long-term investment and cautioned against trying to time short-term market movements.
McNeice said success would increasingly depend on identifying projects that genuinely met changing buyer expectations.
Elbanna said affordable housing remained achievable, but developers needed to deliver more than just homes.
“We can provide affordable housing in this country,” he said.
“But we’ve got to wrap that affordable housing with the things that people want.”
As Australia’s housing affordability debate intensifies, the panellists agreed on one point: without a meaningful increase in housing supply, demand-side measures alone are unlikely to solve the nation’s property challenges.
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