Kayla Schwartz has one of the most dangerous jobs in Roxby Downs, the town where BHP Billiton has just slashed a further 380 jobs from its workforce at the giant Olympic Dam copper and uranium mine in northern South Australia.

She's not deep underground in the mine, but instead fields a torrent of angry calls from property investors demanding to know why their investment property in the town 560 kilometres north of Adelaide is still vacant, and why the asking rent has just dropped $100 a week for a three-bedroom house.

One Roxby Downs real estate agent has 240 rental properties on her books and 60 of them are now vacant. Credit:David Mariuz

Ms Schwartz, a property manager with Andrews Property, calmly tells them she has 240 rental properties on her books and 60 of them are now vacant.

She also lets them know that her husband has just been made redundant in a rapid downward spiral in the mining sector, and it's likely they will be heading elsewhere after arriving in the town a little more than three years ago, when optimism was still high about a $30 billion expansion of Olympic Dam.