There is more to house prices than the median: Cameron Kusher

Median values reflect an estimate of the middle value of all residential properties within a market.

The median is useful for understanding the middle of the market, however across the metropolitan area of our cities there is great deal of diversity in housing values.

Sydney’s median dwelling value as at October 2018 was $833,876 and the SA4 region closest in median value was the Inner South West at $840,805.

Most of the areas that have a median value lower than that of greater Sydney are located some distance from the city centre while those with higher values are typically the areas closer to the city centre or along the coastline.

The city’s most affordable SA4 region is Outer South West ($602,246) and the most expensive is Northern Beaches ($1,383,461).

Across Greater Melbourne, the median dwelling value is recorded at $665,044.

The city’s most affordable region is West ($578,922) and the most expensive region is Inner East ($1,127,558).

Outside of the highly desirable Eastern and Inner regions values are remarkably similar across the remaining Melbourne regions.

In fact, only the Inner East, Inner South and Outer East have median values that are higher than that of Greater Melbourne.

Brisbane’s median dwelling value is currently $491,925.

While that is substantially lower than Sydney and Melbourne you can see that all of the regions relatively close to the city have current median values which are higher than that.

The most expensive region of the city is the West ($659,554) while the most affordable is Ipswich ($350,511).

Only three SA4 regions of the city actually have a median value which is lower than the city-wide median.

Greater Adelaide’s median dwelling value was recorded at $431,554 as at October making it the nation’s most affordable capital city housing market.

Throughout the city’s four SA4 regions, Central and Hills is noticeably more expensive than the rest and North is noticeably cheaper.

Central and Hills and West are more expensive than the city-wide median and South and North are cheaper.

The Inner region of Perth is overwhelmingly the most expensive region of the city while Mandurah is substantially more affordable than all other Perth regions (note it sits on the southern outskirt of the city).

Greater Perth’s median dwelling value is $451,148 and most of the remaining regions of the city have median dwelling values which sit quite close to the city-wide median.

Greater Hobart doesn’t have any individual SA4 regions within the capital city boundary, so the chart provides a comparison in median dwelling values between Hobart and the other SA4 regions of the state.

Hobart is substantially more expensive than the rest of the state with the West and North West the most affordable.

The relatively affordable housing costs outside of Hobart are driving demand with the three regional SA4 regions of Tas having seen the highest rates of value growth nationally over the past year.

In NT, there are only two SA4 regions; Darwin and NT-Outback. As the accompanying chart shows, outside of Darwin the cost of housing is substantially more affordable.

Overall, the data provided offers a more granular insight into how median values in each city compare to smaller regions across each city.

It also reiterates the importance of analysing markets within smaller geographic areas as housing costs or the housing market performance can be vastly different when you look at different areas of a city.

The data also highlights that desirable areas close to the city centre typically have much more expensive housing costs than the broad capital city median.

Although it is clichéd; location, location, location holds true and purchasers still pay a significant premium for well-located properties