It's easy to hear the enthusiasm in Mark Mudford's voice when he talks about the potential to achieve great things for property buyers and vendors across the Central West, and as a local, his words carry added weight.
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The Dubbo-based Sales Executive in LAWD's Agribusiness Transactions Team was born in nearby Gilgandra and owns a farm at Collie, just an hour out of Dubbo.
From the age of 14 he worked with his late father running Merino sheep and cereal cropping on their 2400 hectare property and another 9000 hectares of leased land in North West New South Wales.
"I feel very fortunate to be combining my skills with LAWD's brand and network," Mr Mudford said.
"To me, they're bridging the gap between corporate business and the local agent. It's about being able to talk to the corporate agriculture space but also being approachable and having boots on the ground."
Mr Mudford said the key to rural property sales in the region is marketing, and there was a real opportunity for them and vendors in the Central West region to showcase the area to the broader agricultural community.
"There are properties within adjacent districts that sell for double the land value, so LAWD aims to bring that awareness to the region and provide valuable connections through our network and reach," he said.
In his 20s Mr Mudford worked for AA Co and Stanbroke Pastoral Company in Queensland and the Northern Territory, before travelling to the United States and hauling grain across country for the wheat and corn harvest from the Mexican border in the south, to the north as far as Montana.
Returning home, he started a fertiliser and transport business which helped him to buy his own farm in 2015. Prior to the move to Dubbo, Mr Mudford spent two years as a sales agent on the Mid North Coast of NSW for McCulloch Agencies, expanding his knowledge of different agriculture sectors before the company merged its real estate business into LAWD in September 2023.
Mr Mudford's notable property transactions in the past 12 months include $3.05 million for the 568 hectares 'Part Myall View' at Gilgandra, $2.3 million for 316 hectares for 'The River Run' at Ellenborough, and $3.7 million for the 123 hectares 'Mountain View' in Upper Lansdowne.
He was a finalist in the Real Estate Institute of Australia's 2023 Novice Auctioneer Competition while working for McCulloch Agencies and made another appearance in the Dubbo competition on February 29, 2024 to support the Royal Flying Doctor Service.
It's not all business though - he sees volunteer work just as important to the community. In 2019 in response to the crippling drought, Mr Mudford used his city connections and founded a stand-up comedy group that invited comedians from Sydney, Newcastle and Melbourne to perform in front of rural audiences.
The comedy group is still active and is currently planning a show featuring performers from the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, to be held on April 23 in Dubbo and April 24 at the Collie Hotel.
LAWD Senior Director Col Medway said the appointment of Mr Mudford to the Dubbo team is an indication of LAWD's awareness of the importance of the Central West and Orana Regions of NSW as major producers of irrigated row crops, horticulture, livestock and dryland crops.
"We see it as essential to build the presence of LAWD in regional areas and with his interstate and overseas contacts Mark provides another valuable link in LAWD's network, expanding on the presence already provided by Ian Robertson at Cowra, which gives us a cumulative expertise and on-the-ground experience to efficiently match buyers with sellers," Mr Medway said.
"LAWD's main offices might be in Melbourne, Brisbane, Sydney and Perth, but the company is committed to the regions, and we have staff located in a variety of locations such as Cowra, Tamworth, Yass, Boorowa, Wauchope, Albury, Taroom, Adelaide, Katherine (NT) and Brunswick (WA)."
LAWD has a team of more than 80 specialist staff in offices across the country providing a full suite of professional real estate services including advisory, transactions and valuations, with specialist expertise in the agribusiness, land and development sectors.
