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🎧 Discover the agents behind the For Sale signs and the sales pitch.
Elite Real Estate Agents of SEQ is the go-to podcast for anyone buying, selling, or simply curious about the people driving Southeast Queensland’s dynamic real estate market.
Hosted by Adam Bell, each episode features a genuine, down-to-earth conversation with one of the region’s top-performing real estate agents. From the Gold Coast to Brisbane and everywhere in between, these agents share their personal stories, expert insights, and what it really takes to succeed in a competitive market.
✅ Learn how top agents win listings, build trust, and deliver results
✅ Get local property insights straight from the people making the deals happen
✅ Find out what to look for in a great agent—beyond just a flashy billboard
✅ Meet the agent who could be the perfect fit for your property journey
Whether you’re a homeowner researching agents, an investor watching the market, or a fellow agent looking for inspiration, this podcast puts a spotlight on the real people behind real estate in SEQ.
Welcome to the Elite Real Estate agents of SEQ podcast, where I sit down with some of the most successful and respected real estate agents working right here in one of Australia's most beautiful and sought after regions southeast Queensland. This podcast gives you a genuine behind the scenes look at who these agents are as people, what makes them stand out in the industry.
And most importantly, can help you decide if they're the right fit to guide your property journey. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the conversation. You might just be listening to the perfect person to sell your property.
Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Elite Real Estate Agents of Southeast Queensland Podcast. Now, today I am sitting down to chat with Mark Saveall from McGraw's Southport office now with just over a decade of experience and more than. 800 successful sales under his belt. Mark Saveall is a name that commands respect in the property scene around the churn park and Labrador area of the Gold Coast, known for a straight talking style, relentless drive, and no nonsense approach.
Mark brings a rare mix of professionalism and authenticity that cuts through the noise, whether he's negotiating a premium price. Guiding a first home buyer. Mark's Focus never Waves delivering real results with zero fluff born and bred in Sydney. Having moved to the Gold Coast in 2002, his deep local knowledge is matched only by his commitment to get the job done right.
Let's find out what shaped his career, the secrets to long-term success in a competitive market, and what it really takes to build trust and reputation in today's real estate market. Mark, welcome to the podcast. Thanks,
Adam. Thank you for that introduction. Very nice.
Went okay. Did it? Yeah. Yeah. Sounded pretty good.
Got everything right. Fantastic. Alright. Look, I always like to start by finding out just a little bit about you and, and, and where you've come from. So you, you, you grew up in Sydney?
Yeah. Born and bred on the northern beaches of Sydney.
Okay. A little
place called North Curl. Curl.
Okay.
Um,
right near the beach there.
Made on the
beach. I was very lucky. I was very good childhood, I must admit. Mm-hmm. Yep. Um, but having said that. I would never go back to Sydney. I think the Gold Coast is the best place in the world. Yep. And I, I tell all my friends that all the time. So great upbringing, but this is the place where I wanna be sure.
What, what made you make the move from Sydney? Well, it was never designed to be a Gold Coast move. I was actually, when I had had enough of Sydney in 2002 and the rat race, I had bought a $500 Ford Falcon and I was on my way to the Sunshine Coast. Right. Don't ask me why. I just had it in my head. Okay.
That's where you wanted to go, correct? Yep. Uh, and the car broke down and it rang. And I rang up a friend of mine, Cindy Stuck, who was living in Gibraltar Drive in the Isle of Capri. And I said, Cindy, do you mind if I stay for a couple of days while I work out? What's wrong with the car? And I got a phone call the following day from someone who had heard I was up here because I was running pubs at the time.
Okay.
And I got a job working at the, uh, shearers arms at Ormo. The next day. Okay. And I never made it to the Sunshine Coast. Wow.
Sounds like fate.
Well it was that whole sliding door moment. Right. If the car hadn't have broken down, it would never have ended up. We driven
straight through. Correct. So that's why I'm
here.
Right. And never have seen that that the wonderful shearers arm hotel that is still there today. It's
still there. Yes. And still very big on food. But um, I'm. The pub game is a young man's game. Yep. And that's definitely not my go anymore. Right. So you're not young anymore, is that what you're telling me?
No. No. Okay. Absolutely not. Past that bridge last year, I wouldn't have even thought Omo was there at that time. It must have
been a pretty young pub at the Oh, it
was thriving. Yep. Absolutely. Okay.
So, um, so what then you, you're, you're in the pub game, you're doing that, what drew you to, to real estate? How did that happen?
Talk me through that.
Okay, so I was still in the house with Cindy and, uh, our toaster broke down. And previous to my time in the pub game, I was a franchise owner for Harvey Norman and the Harvey Norman franchise structure. Right? So I thought I knew everything about toasters and electrical. So when the toaster broke down, so Cindy, I'll go and buy a new one from Harvey's.
As I walked into Harvey Norman, a bundle, Jerry Harvey walked out. Jerry went, mark and, Hey Jerry, how you going? Hadn't seen him for, I don't know, 17 years. The guy's got a freakishly good memory. It's amazing that that is. And uh, he said, what are you doing now? I said, I'm still in the pub game. He says, you wanna come back into Harvey's?
And I got a job working at Harvey Norman. There's a little clearance center at the end of the car park there at Harvey Norman Bundle. Yep. Yep. And, uh, Steve Cavalier, the franchise owner, was looking for someone to run it, uh, end up there for 10 years. So, yep, there you go. That's how it ended up. Another sliding, another sliding door moment.
Yes. It was bought on
by a breakdown of something else by the, correct, correct. There you go. Was another breakdown. A little bit of a, a pattern emerging here if I hadn't
have walked in that door that particular time and Jerry was walking out, who knows? Yep. So after my time about, I was 10 years at Harvey's and I just had enough of retail.
Yep. And I needed to do something. I can't hammer a nail straight, so I had to sell something. It was either cars or houses. Yep. And I was. Actually just about to accept a job at Von Biber selling cars. And I got a letter in the mail saying the place that placed the Gibralter Drive, I'd been there for 12 years.
Yep.
Was finally getting taken over by the owner. We had to find a new place to live. Yep. So I was going, doing the, uh. Open homes for rentals. And I walked into an open home and a lady called Deborah, who I had sold a house full of electrical appliances. She was the lady who was doing the open home and she said, oh, mark, I went to Harvey's the other day and you weren't there.
I said, no, no. I'm looking for something new. Yep. And she said, why don't you do real estate? So she rang up Mick Carter, who was her boss. Mick Carter now works for Coastal. Yep. And I went and saw him, and he gave me a job. Right. So that's quite literally how I end up in real estate. So your whole career has just been all full of just moments that have
just Yes.
Yeah. Yeah. Shaped where you next, correct. I haven't,
I can't remember the last time I actually applied for a job. Wow. Things had just happened.
So was that with McGraw then? Have you always been with McGraw? Mick was
with the professionals. He owned a professional franchise in Broad Beach. Right. Uh, and went from there, went to another place, actually went.
For, for a job at Coastal And Dane Atherton said that, uh, mate, I don't have enough time to train you. And at the time I, I thought
Okay, so that, that was Har Court's coastal. Yep.
Yep. And I thought at the time, mate, you don't need to train me. I'm the best ever.
Yep.
Um, but he was spot on. 'cause it takes hard to be, to sell.
Correct. Can't be that selling for a while. I'm just moving from electrical appliances to houses. Yes. And it's, I thought it was gonna be an easy transition. And someone told me once that it does take 10 years to get to know what you're doing and it's spot on. So that to really know, oh, look it, and I'm still learning every day.
Every day I learn, every day. I, I reevaluate how I do, I'm doing stuff to make sure I'm doing it the right way. So. You just never know it all, ever.
Right. So, so, no, no. Good at Coastal. You end up at, um, at Professionals.
Professionals. I got offered a job by a franchise from Melbourne who was trying to set up here.
Yep. Um, and I was, it's when I first moved into the Cherm Park, Labrador area, just 'cause I, I had focused that as an area that I thought we had huge capital growth potential. Mm-hmm. Um, only because it still had that bit of a stigma. Sure. Lock your door, Labrador, stab your door, all those sorts of things.
Right. Love
it.
But, um, I just, it can't have
been too different from when you started out at Nang though. Could it?
Oh, yeah, A little bit. A little bit. But it was just a spot I thought, you can't get that close to the water anywhere else in the Gold Coast for those sort of dollars prices. So it had to go through huge growth, so that's why targeted it.
And Fletcher's was the name of the company from Melbourne. And they end up not delivering. And McGraw had been headhunting me for a while, so it all fell into place and I made the move nine years ago now.
Okay. I was gonna say how long you've been there now. Yeah. Nine years at McGraw. Never looked
back.
Not really happy with McGraw. Fantastic. How many people in the office there at, um, at Southport in, there's six or seven in the rental department and there's probably. I dunno, another eight or 10 in sales in our office. So, and there's now a new, quite a decent size. Just got a new Rubina office. So there's three or four in Rubina.
Yep. So yes, we're growing. Okay.
What, what is it that you, you love most about real estate? Well,
I've
got, apart
from the money. Correct. Because that is ultimately the driver, right? Oh, look, it is for, for, for most people in their careers. I do like the flexibility the industry gives you. Mm-hmm. But what I, I think, I think Austral, I think having your weekends free, I've always worked weekends.
That that's, that's, you're in the pub game used to my, and in retail you're working six days, seven days a week. It makes no difference, right? Yep. Yep. And every time someone says to me, oh, you're working really hard. I, I cast my mind back to when I was working in Sydney in the pub game and you're cleaning up someone's vomit or blood at three o'clock in the morning.
This is not hard. Yeah. Like what we do is not hard. No. It really isn't. But, uh. Australians have got a fascination with real estate. Like it's, in some ways it's a little bit sick. I really do think that. 'cause as soon as you tell someone what you do, they ask you straight away, how's the market going? Yeah.
Like people just get trained, you know, I've always wanted to be a real estate agent. Oh, well have a go. Like what's stopping you? Yep. So I suppose, what do I like about it? I like the money, I like the freedom. I do like there's a couple of opportunities and sometimes where I've really helped people make more money, which has helped them on their next stage.
Yeah. And I love that.
Yep.
So there's a couple of different things I like about you're a cracking
deal and, and someone does really well.
One in particular, young couple were doing the trip around Australia thing and they were banking on a six month trip. And we smashed it out of the park on the price. So it meant they could actually circumnavigate Australia and they spent 18 months away.
Oh, fantastic. All because we just absolutely killed it. Absolutely killed it. Yeah. And that's, that's the sort of thing I do like helping people with. Fantastic.
So do you have a standard week? I mean, if I was to say, what does the, the Mark Saveall Standard Week sort of look like Monday through Sunday? Can you, can you tell me what that looks like or, or does it differ every week?
I've got a standard week in my head. Which ultimately the plan, which ultimately changes because you're never in complete control of your diary. But we have a, an ideal week. We meet every Monday. We have a chat about our week and we plan it out and you try and control that, but then things will pop up.
People will call you out of the blue. You know, I got a phone call two days ago from a another customer of mine. And she looking at selling her mother's place. That wasn't in our plan. Yeah. So everything needed to be flexible. Yep. And then if you've got some spare time, you need to know where you're going back to so you don't lose track of yourself.
Sure.
Pe as you, as you sort of pointed out just a minute ago, people have a, a, a mindset around real estate agents, what you do, how you do it, what, what would surprise. The average punter about something that, that you do in, in your week that they wouldn't expect that? How much
people lie to us. Really?
Absolutely. Okay. Explain that to me. Well, when I, when I was in the pub game, I thought I had seen the worst of people. But when you're talking about considerable life-changing amounts of money, people will do some of the worst things possible you've ever seen. And I'll give you an example. I was gonna, well, I was gonna ask, I.
So there was one old bloke, Peter, who was in a two story townhouse. Yep. Uh, and his knees had buggered up on him and he couldn't handle the stairs anymore. He rang me, so can Mark, can you help me sell? I said, yep. You wanted to go into a little one bedroom villa. Happy days, Pete. So we sold the place for him, but for whatever reason, some time in the past he had put the, the property in his two daughter's names.
Right. And it was a, and by law we have to separate the money in the name. Of the people who own it, and we gotta put in their bank accounts. And the whole idea was then the girls were gonna give it back to him so he could buy his one bedroom villa. One of the girls didn't give him his money. Oh, oh. So 175 grand, which he needed to buy the next, the next step.
Yep. And she worked at the fish markets at Piermont and I rang her myself when he told me what was going on. And her exact words were, it's my inheritance anyway. He's gonna die soon. I need it now.
And you had, you, you in earlier, in the earlier stages of this, you'd heard the verbal agreements between them all and, and you know, it's a family.
You're just expecting it's a family thing. It's, it's all go. He said,
yep, the girls will do it. He put a deposit on the one bedroom villa. He couldn't fi, couldn't finish. Luckily he got his money back. But to my knowledge, I think the guy's still renting. Wow. Seven years later.
Wow.
But that's the sort of thing that people do when there's a lot of money.
They just do horrible things.
Oh, it does. Yeah. It is. And you, you're right. It's not something I don't really think about too much that you guys, you know, with every transaction, it's, it's for most people, life
changing amounts of money. Especially when the money we're talking about now and things. Now we're selling three bedroom asbestos shacks for a million dollars.
Yep. Where 10 years ago there were 400,000. Like that's a lot of money. Mm-hmm. Absolutely. And people act accordingly. Alright. So yes, we get lied to a lot. There you go.
Wow. We Alright, so, um, tell me about your selling style. What, uh, what, uh, without giving away secrets, um, what do you know about selling property that others don't?
I suppose I ask more questions than a lot of people. Yep. And I try and give very honest advice. Mm-hmm. And that's not always taken well. 'cause some people, regardless of them asking your opinion, they want to hear what they have in the back of their head where I don't do that. And I must admit, I used to about, until about, um, five years ago, I used to tell them what they wanted to hear and, and.
Try and be the person that they thought a real estate agent used to be. Right. But I was tripping up all the time. Sure. And I wasn't having a great deal of success. I was muddling along. Mm-hmm. And then about five years ago, I went, fuck that. I'm just gonna be me and I'm gonna be honest, and I'm gonna be upfront.
And I'm gonna have no filters. Yep. And, and if that's, if they resonate with that, then they're my people. Yep. And I'm gonna love working with them. Yep. And if that doesn't suit them, then that's cool. Like I'm okay with that. It's probably best
for, for both sides. Correct.
We just both walk away. Love it. And that, I think is, is the number one thing that I pride myself on.
I've actually said to many people, I'm like the coriander of real estate. You either love it or you hate it. Yeah. Hate it. And that's okay.
Yep. I do love coriander by, go by the way,
just for anyone who might be interested in that. You coriander? No, I'm not a Corian guy, but that's okay. But okay. You know I've lost other listings.
Lost the list in the um. I dunno, maybe 12 months ago. And I rang them up because I always like to know why I didn't get the gig. Yep. And Blake said, mate, my wife doesn't, didn't gel with you. And I said, okay, fair enough. No problem. Like, if you got any questions, you need a hand, help me. I'm here for you. You know,
you probably, I, I would imagine like most agents in the early days would take on every listing that you could possibly get and do everything to get every listing and, and had a, a whole set of dramas the whole way through and, and almost wished you hadn't.
Well, there's always some listings that you wish you didn't take. Yes. Yep. But ultimately, if you ask the right questions and someone's genuine, and that's again, all part of the feeling out process. Sure. Sure. And if it, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. Yep.
What, um, what does a great client
experience mean to you?
A great client experience, um, or I'll give you an example, seven Goss Avenue, which we just sold at auction a couple of weeks ago. Okay. Um, Kiwi Couple, Anna and Todd. Really nice people. Yep. They sat down and said, what do we need to do, mark? Um, we spoke about presentation, we spoke about Open Homes Methodist sale.
Yep. Um, we took everything on board. They took everything on board. They followed the, we gave 'em a marketing plan. It was followed. We did the right thing, and everything worked out right, and we sold it under the hammer for a really good price, and they can now move on. They're super happy. The people who are buying it are super happy.
Like that is just a perfect scenario. Now, unfortunately, it doesn't always work out that way. Yep. But in that particular case, they took what we said on board and they could have actually turned around on the day and said, no, we want more. Yeah. But they understood that we had done absolutely everything.
Everything we'd marketed it properly. Hundreds, thousands of people had seen the place. Yep. And they understood that we had done absolutely everything and they couldn't get expect a better result. Perfect. Yeah, it was, that probably
leans into my next question, maybe you've already answered, but it was gonna be, you know, maybe a time you've gone the extra mile, done something that other agents wouldn't that got a result where, you know, in, in other circumstances that may not have happened.
Well, the most recent one that comes to mind is I was selling 12 Musgrave Avenue, which was an A derelict, knocked down, yep. XC crack den. Okay, there you go. With the swimming pool out the back, and it was an absolute bomb site and we weren't getting the traction and the number of people through the open home as I had hoped.
And the Friday before our auction, there was another auction about 400 meters away, another older house that the public trustees were selling. So I went to that particular auction and there was five or six people there who would. Raising their hand that I had never seen at my open home. We were literally only 400 meters apart.
But mine was in Southport and theirs was in Labrador. Right. So some people, even though everyone says, oh, I always check the internet, you, they don't always check the internet. So I stood outside that home and I handed out my business cards to the five other people mm-hmm. Who had missed out on that property.
And one of those came to our auction on the Saturday and bought the house. Wow. So if I hadn't have gone to that auction on the Friday, they would've never seen us. They would never have teamed out. Even though you were that close? Yep. And as it turned out, we've now sold 'em a second property all because I went on that Friday and stood out with business cuts and I dunno, any other agent that would do that, or if, if it does, no one's told me about it.
Fantastic. Fantastic. Love
that story. What about a career highlight? Anything stand out to you in your. In your 12 odd years?
No, I've still, I think that's still yet to come, to tell you the truth. Yep. Yeah. There's still, there's still things that I want to achieve. So What's that? What do you wanna achieve?
What are your goals from here? Um, I want to have a, what they call an effective business unit. So I want to have myself and Ash, she's joined me eight or nine months ago and two other people, and I want to be able to just, I wanna own Labrador. Okay. At the moment I've got a decent market share and I think we're doing a pretty good job, but we can do better.
And, uh, when we've got about a 35% or 30% market share of Labrador, then I'll be a happy man. Okay. So
tell me about
Ash. You
work
as a
team
now? Yes. Yep. Ash is in the, from the property management section of McGraw. Great. Um, come into sales. She's getting ahead around that. She's started doing the admin at first.
Mm-hmm. And she's gonna progress into sales. And we are now, by the way, looking for someone to come and help us join in the admin side of things. So if you've got a bit of a marketing background and you. I dunno, you might be a nine to three school mom perhaps, or someone younger. Who wants to start? We looking for our third person?
Okay. The contact details will be in the show notes for anyone listening. Good. Oh 4 0 3 7 8 8 7 5 7.
Get that down. Get that down. Alright, fantastic. So I wanna give you a quick fire, what I call my quick fire round now. Okay? Okay. So first, um, short, quick answers that first come to mind. One word to describe your negotiation style.
Staunch words clients
would use to describe you. Honest pain in the ass. And I understand that, you know? Yeah. Um, trustworthy, hardworking, excellent. Biggest myth about real estate agents. That we go to the pub on a Friday afternoon and, and laugh it up all the time, right? They used to, but that, I don't believe that happens anymore.
No, I think, I always think the biggest one is that all you guys do is go and put up the for sale sign, sit back and wait, and, oh, everyone, everyone thinks it's collect a big commission check.
Everyone thinks it's easy. Actually, a couple of blokes at the local bowling club I drink at. A couple have said to me, oh, it must be easy, so I've just given you my phone and said, go on, you do it.
Make money. You do it. They look at me with a blank face. So yeah, there's a couple of misconceptions out there. Sure. Weirdest thing you've seen at an open home, a bunch full of dildos and ASRS plugs covered in oil that it's soaked onto the carpet.
And it was there out in the open at, please tell me, these are renters, not the owners.
They were the owners. Oh God. They were the owners.
She was the owner
should say. Now I do wanna point out to our listeners, mark obviously is the, the most honest, um, one I've had on this, um, on this podcast so far. 'cause every other person who I've asked that question, they've said, well, here's the one I can tell you.
I thought, I thought they all wanted to say the one you just did. I thought we were being honest. Yep. No, perfect. Perfect. If your real estate career was a movie, what would it be called? The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. I love it. Love it. Alright, your number one top tip for homeowners
when selling. Do your homework.
Before you pick a real estate agent, go to their open homes and see how they handle people. See if they ask the questions, see how the houses are presented. Have a look at their marketing material. So many people get someone come in, listen to someone for 15 minutes and then sign their largest asset up to 'em.
It makes no sense to me whatsoever. So do more than what Do your research people do, your due diligence like it's nuts. Fantastic.
Alright, so final question. You can look straight down the down the barrel here, but look, if there is somebody listening, especially in that Labrador. Sort of area, um, and they're considering using you as their agent, what would you say to them?
At the very worst, get me in to have a chat. I will, I might not be your guy, but I'll certainly give you right advice, which will help you moving forward, regardless of who you choose.
Fantastic. Excellent. Well, look, mark Saveall from McGraws in Southport. Thanks so much for joining me on, uh, the elite real Estate agents of Southeast Queensland podcast.
It's, um, it's been a pleasure. I love you. I love you straightforward, uh, no nonsense, honest style. I, I really do. And, um, look, make sure you do, um, if you do want to connect with Mark. Um, all of his details are there in our, our show notes and, um, the links will be on our socials and everything else. So, um, mark, thanks again for joining us.
Thanks, man. It's been fun. Appreciate it. Absolutely. Cheers. Thanks so much for joining us on this episode of Elite Real Estate Agents of SEQ. If today's guest sounded like the right agent to help with your next move, please reach out. You'll find all their details in the show notes and episode description.
And if you're a real estate agent interested in being showcased on the podcast, visit www dot. Pod pro australia.com au to learn more and register your interest. If you enjoyed the podcast, we'd love it if you could like share and rate the podcast and let us know in the comments if there's an agent you've dealt with and you think they should be featured next.
Thanks again for listening and we'll see you on the next episode.