For love, not money, swimming champ Cate Campbell makes next property move

Cate Campbell is used to climbing out of pools after training her way to a pair of Olympic golds and the 100m freestyle world record.

Now the Brisbane swimming champion is climbing the property ladder with a shrewd move that has seen her upgrade a Bowen Hills apartment for an inner city Queenslander — and she couldn’t be happier.

“When I first started looking I thought I wanted something modular, something clean with open plan living and marble benchtops and concrete walls but after I started going to a few open homes I realised those places weren’t feeling like home for me. I couldn’t picture myself living somewhere like that,” she says.

“This house is much more me; it’s old, it’s a bit daggy — I’m old and a bit daggy — I think we suit each other.”

Of course, the sprint queen is anything but old and daggy and the same goes for her house; a beautiful 1940s gabled Queenslander complete with original leadlight windows, high ceilings, picture rails and front and back decks.

Perched on a 607 square metre block in a quiet Morningside street, it’s a suburban haven where young children play in the street. “I really love that, despite the fact I don’t have kids of my own,” Campbell laughs.

“A little part of me still loves New Farm and Teneriffe but I’m quickly getting converted to the south side — I love Bulimba.”

It’s not Campbell’s first foray into the property market. She and younger sister Bronte, a fellow world champion who won Olympic gold with Cate in Rio, bought an apartment at Bowen Hills together nearly four years ago.

After their training was moved from the Valley pool to the Sleeman Centre at Chandler in Brisbane’s eastern suburbs, they both decided it was time to take the next step on the property ladder and acquire properties of their own.

“We’d just decided it was the next step of growing up. We’d lived together since we left home quite young. Because we do so much together, we wanted to do something that was just ours, individually,” she says.

Cate says they didn’t seek out professional advice, just saved hard and started their searching after returning from the Rio Olympics with a clear idea of what they wanted.

The pair were also conscious of the limitations of their earnings as career swimmers and were keen to secure their futures in bricks and mortar. Prior to Cate’s Morningside buy, Bronte purchased a house in nearby Coorparoo.

“Swimmers have very short careers. I’m one of the fortunate few who has managed to make a decent living from it,” Cate says.

“You have to take advantage of these opportunities when they come your way but it was something I had to consider — how far I could stretch myself while considering the instability of our profession.”

With this in mind, Cate purchased a Queenslander with dual living capabilities, where both levels have two bedrooms, two bathrooms and a kitchen. A couple of her friends live in the lower level, while she occupies the top.

“This property was the perfect answer to everything. My housemates help me pay the mortgage but we get to live separately and come and go as we please,” she says.

“It’s a great arrangement. They mow the lawn and cook me scones and in return I provide them with unlimited internet for things like Netflix and give them mates rates on the rent.”

Savvy investing aside, Cate’s main priority was finding something she really loved to live in.

“It was more important to me to love where I live and be happy, rather than buying something because it was a good investment,” she says.

“I could have probably bought something that made me more money down the line but I don’t have time for renovating and I still want to have a life.”