Sydney now has 14 super-prestige suburbs and 121 above the $1 million median

Sydney has 14 suburbs with median prices of $2 million or more, according to Australian Property Monitors.

Point Piper tops the list with its $9.9 million median price.

Dr Andrew Wilson, the senior economist at APM , describes prestige housing market as generally having been quiet in the past four years since rising interest rates and the global financial crisis flattened demand from aspirational buyers.

He notes Sydney had 121 suburbs with median house prices of more than $1 million in the six months to July.

"This was one more than the number recorded in the previous six months.

"The number of property sales in suburbs with a $1 million median house price was also up, from 3,950 in the six months ending in January to 3953 recorded in the six months to July," Wilson says.

Some 15% of all sales recorded in Sydney in the six months to July were for properties in $1 million-plus median suburbs, compared with 7% in Melbourne.

The latest Australian Property Monitors data has the July quarter Sydney median house price at $639,484 – 16% and approaching $100,000 more expensive than Melbourne's $551,006.

"Sydney prices have also streaked ahead of Perth's. At the start of 2007, Perth's median was $530,000 – almost the same as Sydney's,” Wilson says.

"Perth's median remains $530,000, while Sydney's has risen 20% since then.”

The disparity between Sydney and the other capitals is even more pronounced, according to the APM data.

Brisbane's and Adelaide's median house price sits at $440,667 and $437,002 respectively, which is nearly $200,000 or 45% less expensive than Sydney's.

Wilson suggests another important point of difference is that despite being the most expensive, Sydney's market was also the most resilient.

"The 0.6% drop over the year to July is the best result of all the major capitals, with only volatile Darwin showing any growth (3.8 %)," he notes.