UnitingCare Queensland removes aged care home from village plan
15 years ago, the Not For Profit operator received approval to build a retirement living community and aged care home on vacant land on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast.
There has since been a series of changes and extensions to that approval. In September last year, The Weekly SOURCE reported on plans for its first new retirement village in over a decade, with Stage 1 of Bokarina Beach Village.
The first stage is set to deliver 28 freestanding three-bedroom homes under its BlueCare brand.
The large tract of land remains untouched, although UnitingCare Queensland have stated that work on Stage 1 will begin early this year.
Now UnitingCare Queensland have lodged a development application dated 19 December 2025 for Stage 2, which will consist of 234 units across four separate buildings ranging up to six storeys.
The second stage would occupy 2.04 hectares of the broader 6.36-hectare ‘parent site’, which originally had approval for a $100 million retirement community with more than 340 units and a 96-bed aged care home, granted in 2010.
This new application seeks to replace the approved Stage 2 with the new proposal, which removes the aged care home.
A town planning report by Adams and Sparkes Town Planning on behalf of UnitingCare Queensland says the 234 proposed units would include a mix of two- and three-bedrooms.
The facility would also include a community centre and outdoor communal open spaces such as an accessible pool, lawns and a variety of landscaped seating and shaded areas.
“Bokarina Beach Village will offer residents a wonderful lifestyle in a unique location,” BlueCare Retirement Living General Manager Natalie Smith said.
“The architectural design makes the most of the Sunshine Coast’s easy living lifestyle.”
A concurrent application is also before the Sunshine Coast Council to amend the overriding Kawana Waters Development Agreement to rearrange the site’s existing precinct boundaries to better align with the proposed development staging, and to increase the maximum building height in Stage 2 from four storeys to six storeys.
“The increased building height at the northern portion of the site is designed to shift density closer to the Lake Kawana Boulevard commercial precinct and the adjacent Bokarina Beach development while being sensitive to Club Kawana and neighbouring residents,” a UnitingCare Queensland spokesperson said.
