Meet Antoinette Nido, former Victorian Treasury economist turned real estate agent

RT Edgar consultant and former Victorian Treasury economist Antoinette Nido has had a love affair with real estate most of her life. When young, she hoped to become a full-time landlord; by 22 she had bought her first house and, as a young mum seeking flexibility, she developed her family’s property trust.

You bought your first house at 22 – where was it?

It was a Victorian weatherboard on large land in Dover Street, Flemington. It was clean as a whistle and I think I paid $100,000 for it.

Did your family place a high value on acquiring property?

I came from an Italian migrant family and I am the youngest of seven children. My love affair with real estate was because I saw it as a way of being financially independent.

You must have started earning early?

I graduated from Melbourne Uni and majored in economics and law. I duxed economics at uni and worked as a graduate economist in Treasury. I remember being very well paid and I was living at home. I was at Treasury for about five years. In those days, they had about one graduate economist and I was it. You had to sink or swim in a week. You’d be briefing the premier in a one-pager on key indicators.

After you left the Treasury, you went to Ernst and Young?

Yes, I was tax director for them for many years. I was at the pinnacle of my career then and was working 80 hours a week.

You then moved into developing your family’s property trust. Why the switch?

The big prompt was being a woman: I got married and I had two children 20 months apart. When I had John, our eldest, I was on an international tax case – and I went to New York and Chicago. I was still breastfeeding, and my husband came along to help. I thought everyone did this. When we had the second one I realised things would need to change. We eventually had three children and I ran the financial and legal aspects of the family business. It meant I could be with the children.

What was your family business?

My husband and I started our own super fund and set up a property trust. We started to buy investment properties and a retail pharmacy business. We have three beautiful responsible, well-balanced kids and we’re still married. It’s been a really good partnership.

Two years ago, you moved to RT Edgar – how has that been?

Being a mature woman with life experience I’ve taken to it like a duck to water. Being able to read people is also very, very important.

What is it like in this market?

Having been an investor, my emphasis was always on careful selection of properties. In this more challenging market, you see the consequences of people having rushed in buying B or C-grade properties.

What has your own experience of buying family homes been like?

I always pinch myself every time I come home. We’ve been in South Yarra about 25 years. We were living in the area … and I would walk past and admire this house every day for years. We came to buy it in 2000 and did a painstaking restoration. It is a beautiful Georgian home.