Matt Knight, Buyer's Agent

In Matt’s words

Life before Real Estate

I didn’t set out to start a buyer’s agency. For fifteen years I was a social worker. Investing and renovating was a hobby back then.

I started in the community tech sector, running an IT education centre for people in social housing in Waterloo. Three thousand public housing dwellings sat in one inner-city pocket, and the internet was still a luxury.

Later I moved into statutory child protection. Eight years of it. Complex, high-stakes work, some of it life or death for the children involved.

That work taught me something I still use every day. Sitting with people as they make frightening, high-consequence decisions. Listening to their worries. Helping them think clearly when everything in them wants to freeze or avoid.

I didn’t know it at the time, but that turned out to be something I really enjoy about the role. It’s a privilege to help people through stressful moments.

Property Renovating

Mum and Dad bought an investment property when I was young, and the idea stuck. I read property books for fun in high school.

We were too young to catch the 1998 to 2003 Sydney boom. We watched prices triple, and real estate started to feel like an impossible mountain to climb.

But those early books paid off. I knew there were other markets we could afford. We travelled and did our research. Our first renovation was in Brisbane and cost us $65,000, which sounds laughable now. We bought and renovated three in a row and caught the bug properly.

The sea change

We were living in Sydney’s south, working long hours. We loved the life but not the traffic or the hustle.

So every spare weekend and holiday we drove the coast, up and down NSW and Queensland, looking for the spot we could picture ourselves in.

We landed on the NSW South Coast. Pristine beaches, and close enough to Sydney to stay close to family. We gave ourselves a two-year out clause in case we hated it. We never used it.

A beer with my accountant

The business came a few years later. It was born in a pub, on a weeknight, over a beer with my accountant, Ben.

He said, “Matt, twelve of my clients have told me you helped them find or buy their investment property. Nobody has lost money yet. What’s going on?”

I told him it was a hobby. I loved the research, the travel, even the inspections.

His reply was short. “You’ve got a business here. Time to start charging.”

That line took root. I studied, got my licence, and went looking for the tiny, little-known industry of people who hunt houses for a living. Buyer’s agents were not well known back then. I found one, Alan Fox, founder of the original Central Coast firm Propertunity. I bought him lunch and asked him everything I could.

Hunch confirmed. People do want help buying houses.

The launch

So I took the leap. One income. A young family. I walked away from a steady government salary for an industry most people had never heard of.

It was the most exposed I had ever felt. What could possibly go wrong!

That was nearly fifteen years ago. Since then we have helped clients buy more than 450 homes. Up and down the South Coast, across southern regional NSW, and in a few other pockets our repeat investors have taken us, including coastal Western Australia, where we now have a small team.

Fifteen years in: What I’ve learned

We are dealing with real money, so the stakes are high.

People come to us in the middle of big life transitions, and the consequences play out over years, sometimes decades. Buying a home pushes people’s buttons. It stirs up fear, and sometimes old memories, and it can make a hard decision even harder.

Walking with someone through that, all the way to a good result, is the part I never expected to love as much as I do.

Helping someone buy an asset that significant is an honour. No shortcuts. Relentlessly in your corner until the job is done well.

If things get emotional along the way, that is not a problem. I’m used to sitting with people in hard times, and finding a way through.

We work so you win.