Tamarama shines as Australia’s most expensive property market as downturn costs Point Piper its crown: RP Data

Sydney’s beachside suburb Tamarama is now Australia’s most expensive suburb for real estate according to RP Data, after growing 38% in the past five years.

With a median house price of $4,337,500, the glitzy suburb has the highest median house price in Australia.

Affectionally known as Glamarama, the suburb also recorded the highest rate per square metre, at $11,449 with an average lot size of 379 square metres in a report prepared earlier this year by RP Data.

Tamarama plucked the prime position in the median price list from Point Piper, which has now dropped off the list following a difficult time for high-end real estate.

RP Data’s Cameron Kusher says Tamarama’s limited supply of houses, many with ocean views, has led to the high median prices.

He says there have been recent introductions of more small lot housing, contributing to the higher rate per square metre.

The suburb is known as Sydney’s home of the rich and famous.

The suburb is also home to one of Australia’s oldest surf life-saving club, which claims to have never lost a life to the surf despite often treacherous conditions.

The four-bedroom hilltop property 29 Thompson Street recently sold for $7.9 million after trading for $4 million in 2003. The 575-square-metre property was listed for 29 days. It was sold by McGrath agents Bethwyn Richards and Ben Collier.

The most recent sale listed on RP Data is the three-bedroom 29 Tamarama Street, which sold for $1.09 million. The 316-square-metre property last traded in 1987 for $120,000. It was sold by Century 21 agent Nicholas Armstrong-Smith.

One of the cheapest sales in Tamarama this year was the two-bedroom unit 13/3 Pacific Avenue, which sold for $880,000 through McGrath agent Simon Exleton.

Sydney has seven of the 10 most expensive suburbs in Australia, Perth has two and Melbourne has just one.

In second place was Perth’s Peppermint Grove at $3.4 million, followed by Sydney’s Bellevue Hill ($3.3 million), Vaucluse ($2.9 million), and Double Bay ($2.5 million), Melbourne’s Toorak ($2.5 million) and Perth’s Dalkeith ($2.2 million).

News Limited reports top-end suburbs including Woollahra, Balmain East and Neutral Bay in Sydney, Armadale in Melbourne and Newstead in Brisbane all slipped in the rankings, with falls in median property prices of up to 24% in the last 12 months.

In the $1 million-plus market, Point Piper had the worst falls, with median unit prices dropping 41% in the past year.

Recording the biggest growth in Australia for the year, Queensland’s mining town of Moranbah, 150 kilometres inland from Mackay, recorded a 46% highest increase in median house prices to $682,000.

North Booval, a suburb of Ipswich, Queensland, was the weakest performer for houses, with median price falls for the year of 44% to $154,000.

For apartments, Currumbin in the Gold Coast was the best performer, with a median price jump of 48% to $565,000.

The biggest fall for units was in central Queensland’s Lammermoor, with prices dropping 46% to $166,000.

House prices fell in all capital cities, led by 5.5% falls in Sydney, followed by 5.2% in Brisbane, 5% in Melbourne, 4.1% in Perth, 3.8% in Adelaide, 3.8% in Darwin, 1% in Hobart 0.9% in Canberra.

Units in Darwin and Canberra recorded the only increases during the year, with both recording increases of less than 1%.