Hack has travelled to St Helens ahead of the One Night Stand to meet some young people who are bucking the national trend and moving to the country.

St Helens is a beautiful sleepy coastal town on the north-eastern coast of Tasmania, known for its fishing, surfing, and proximity to the pristine Bay of Fires.

At the last census, the town had just over 2,000 residents - although this number swells to over 10,000 during the summer holiday period.

Tasmania also has a long history of being a honeypot for treechanging retirees, and it's no different in St Helens. The town's median age is 55.

However, Tasmania is currently riding high on a tourism boom. There's a lot of buzz around and this is bringing people back to the Apple Isle.

St Helens is a microcosm of this broader trend, with a bunch of young people taking advantage of the relatively cheap price of housing compared to the big cities.

'This is a phenomenon we see across small town Australia'

At the 2011 census, there were around 500 people between 20 and 30 living in the St Helens area.

Five years later, in the most recent census, only 32 per cent of the men in that age bracket had remained in St Helens, and just 22 per cent of the women.

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Whatsapp Cait moved to St Helens to start a cafe.

That means hundreds of young people left the town in a five-year period.

Head of research at the Demographics Group, Simon Kuestenmacher, says this isn't a trend that's unique to St Helens.

"This is a phenomenon we see across small town Australia," Simon told Hack.

"We see this big divide in Australia between the large cities which experience massive population growth and those small towns that could do with a bit more population."

However, Simon predicts this will change.

"Looking into the future, I would expect more people to go small-town Australia because technology does allow more and more for remote working arrangements."

Sean and Caitlyn: Cafe owners

Sean and Caitlyn fell in love with the east coast of Tasmania and the lifestyle it offered, and saw a hole in the market when it came to coffee.

They had both studied in Hobart, and Sean shifted to St Helens where he could surf and do his master course remotely. When Caitlyn followed him, they decided to open their cafe, Swims.

"I think there's a lot of young people that are taking advantage of the booming tourist market, or just getting creative with their livelihoods," Caitlyn told Hack.

It's the beautiful lifestyle and rhythm and ocean and all the amazing things in this area.

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Whatsapp Sean.

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Whatsapp Sean and Cait.

Sean says there's less competition in the hospitality business in regional areas.

"I don't think I'd ever open a cafe in the city. Up here, the slower pace and a bit less less competition meant we could create something and it was already unique and we could set the vibe."

Dion: Surfing and sunglasses

Dion Agius has carved out an idyllic situation. He's a professional free surfer, meaning he doesn't compete but is sponsored and appears in surfing videos, photoshoots, and gets to take surfing trips around the world.

He grew up in St Helens but moved away in high school to Surfers Paradise, and it wasn't until he got nostalgic on a roadtrip around Tassie that he thought about moving back.

I just love the emptiness of it, it blows my mind that it's still so untouched.

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Whatsapp Dion.

He was able to buy a 40 hectare property with a house on it for about "half the price" of an apartment in Sydney or Melbourne.

Dion also runs a sunglasses label with his mate, and thanks to the internet, he can do a lot of that work remotely.

"It's lucky nowadays with the internet, you can work from your phone or laptop. I do a lot of the work and design stuff from here and have a setup in the house."

Andy: Town pharmacist

Like many Tasmanians, Andy moved away from St Helens to finish years 11 and 12 at a Launceston college.

He then moved to Hobart to study pharmacy and lived there for about eight years, until the sole pharmacist position in St Helens became available.

For Andy, being able to afford his own house 50 metres from the beach was a major drawcard to moving back home.

"There were a few reasons, there's really cheap houses, my work pays a bit better in rural areas, and the lifestyle - good surf, mountain bike trails.

"It's just a really good place to live."