{"id":486750,"date":"2026-02-17T23:50:15","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T23:50:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/486750\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T23:50:15","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T23:50:15","slug":"investors-bet-on-empty-building-and-passionate-self-starters-transform-charleville-cbd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/486750\/","title":{"rendered":"Investor’s bet on empty building and passionate self-starters transform Charleville CBD"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few years ago, Charleville’s main street had lost its spark \u2014 storefronts sat empty and windows were shuttered.<\/p>\n

In country Australia, you’ve probably driven through a place just like it.<\/p>\n

So, what does it take to bring back a main street?<\/p>\n

In Charleville, about an eight-hour drive west of Brisbane, an interstate investor took a punt on the quiet town.<\/p>\n

Why this property investor is taking a punt on a small, drought-stricken outback town<\/a><\/p>\n

When Max Jones was looking for his next place to invest in, he\u00a0passed up a coastal city for Charleville.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2021, after a 7,000-kilometre hunt through Queensland, Max Jones purchased an almost empty property in the CBD.<\/p>\n

Several years later, it’s a hive of activity, with 10 out of the 11 commercial spaces in use.<\/p>\n

“There’s a doctor’s surgery, pathology, NDIS support, there’s a cafe, a florist, a beautician, legal service \u2026 all services that we really need to have in our communities,” the build-to-rent developer from Condobolin in New South Wales said.<\/p>\n

“It’s always a ‘build it, and they will come’ scenario \u2026 it’s everyone’s street, and to make it work everyone has to want it to be better.<\/p>\n

“It’s been a dream run.”<\/p>\n

\"People<\/p>\n

The two-storey building wraps around one of the main corners of Charleville.\u00a0 (ABC Western Qld: Hannah Walsh)<\/p>\n

The turnaround has been so strong that Mr Jones has purchased four more buildings in Charleville, including the abandoned Hotel School of Arts.<\/p>\n

But bringing back the main street in a small town takes more than one person.<\/p>\n

“There’s a range of stakeholders that are involved, landlords, investors, councils, government \u2026 it’s those areas working together,” Queensland small business commissioner Nicolle Kelly said.<\/p>\n

“It’s thinking outside the box sometimes on what the town and community actually can and are willing to support.”\"An<\/p>\n

There are still some empty storefronts in Charleville’s main street.\u00a0 (ABC Western Qld: Hannah Walsh)<\/p>\n

‘Maybe I want to start a coffee shop’<\/p>\n

Passionate self-starters like 31-year-old April Smith almost stumbled into leasing a space in the first building Mr Jones bought.<\/p>\n

\"April<\/p>\n

April Smith opened a cafe in Charleville in 2022.\u00a0 (ABC Western Qld: Hannah Walsh)<\/p>\n

In 2022, she was peering through the window.<\/p>\n

“The guy who bought the building [Max] was renovating. He saw me looking in at the shop and asked what I was doing,” Ms Smith said.<\/p>\n

“I was like, ‘I don’t know, maybe I want to start a coffee shop,’ and that’s how it started.<\/p>\n

“Max paid for 50\/50 of our renovations, asked me what I wanted and fitted it out for me.”<\/p>\n

\"Hands<\/p>\n

April Smith saw the need for a speciality coffee shop in Charleville.\u00a0 (ABC Rural: Maddelin McCosker)<\/p>\n

Ms Smith said she wouldn’t have started the business anywhere else.<\/p>\n

“I couldn’t afford coastal living for one, and the leases on the coast are just through the roof,” she said.<\/p>\n

“It’s affordable, so there’s lots of people moving out to Charleville wanting to start businesses or have other jobs, and it’s just cheaper to live.”<\/p>\n

Mr Jones said his “crazy investment” came with some challenges.<\/p>\n

“Old buildings, you never quite know what you’re going to uncover,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Financing is a huge one; banks tend to play postcode discrimination.”<\/p>\n

The developer is also in the process of converting the top floor of the initial property into 16 residential apartments.<\/p>\n

\"street<\/p>\n

The developer plans to convert the top floor of the building into residential apartments. (Supplied: Max Jones)<\/p>\n

He said that was because the town was not immune to housing shortages experienced in capital cities.<\/p>\n

“The lack of rental and properties to purchase in regional areas is starting to cripple our areas,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Our towns can’t grow if we don’t have housing.”<\/p>\n

Cheap, casual arrangements<\/p>\n

It’s not just one building in town that is inspiring new businesses and daring people to dream a little.<\/p>\n

Thirty-one-year-old Deanna Reynolds has opened an art studio under an old pub.<\/p>\n

“They were really keen to get people into it \u2026 having someone come in and paint the walls and have a presence in the building was really appealing,” she said.<\/p>\n

\"Deanna<\/p>\n

Deanna Reynolds’s studio is located beneath Hotel Charleville.\u00a0 (ABC Western Qld: Hannah Walsh)<\/p>\n

After running a business in a coastal town in NSW and never taking home a wage, she said she “swore black and blue” she would never own a bricks-and-mortar shopfront again.<\/p>\n

“The expenses were extortionate \u2026 it really scarred me,” she said.<\/p>\n

But in Charleville, she’s taking advantage of a cheap, casual rental arrangement and a supportive community, hosting art classes.<\/p>\n

“It went berserk. There were so many people in the community that were interested, not just in town, people from out of town,” Ms Reynolds said.<\/p>\n

“The whole fit out of the space was paid with term one invoices that people wanted to pay early to make the space easier to get.<\/p>\n

“The forethought of the community out here is insane.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The art studio is on the ground floor of the Hotel Charleville building.\u00a0 (ABC Western Qld: Hannah Walsh)<\/p>\n

Small town, big ideas<\/p>\n

For Ms Reynolds, setting up an art studio in Charleville is redefining where her teaching degree could take her.<\/p>\n

Two years ago, the mother of two was living on the Sunshine Coast while trying to finish her degree.<\/p>\n

\"Deanna<\/p>\n

Deanna Reynolds says she loves the upbringing kids are offered in Charleville.\u00a0 (ABC Western Qld: Hannah Walsh)<\/p>\n

“I needed to not work 30 hours a week, raise two kids, commute as much as I did, and also study,” she said.<\/p>\n

“We needed to be somewhere that we could survive and live healthily off a single income.<\/p>\n

“We were sick of the rat race.”<\/p>\n

Ms Reynolds said the country move had brought exactly the life her family had been hoping for.<\/p>\n

“It’s just not something you can do in the city, which feels a bit special because we get to have this beautiful, quiet life and live a passionate job,” she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A few years ago, Charleville’s main street had lost its spark \u2014 storefronts sat empty and windows were…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":486751,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[64,63,99,246231,246233,246235,246232,246234,183813],"class_list":["post-486750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-charleville-arts-studio","tag-charleville-build-to-rent","tag-charleville-business-lease","tag-charleville-development","tag-charleville-hotel-school-of-arts","tag-max-jones"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=486750"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486750\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/486751"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=486750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=486750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=486750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}