Gold Coast house prices now Australia’s 2nd most expensive
Growth in the waterfront city’s market has continued to surge post-pandemic with a steady stream of new arrivals and robust price growth on the horizon.
The Gold Coast’s median price of $1.17 million has registered as the second most expensive in Australia, with the city’s growth on track to equal Sydney’s current $1.7 million median by 2027, as pointed out in a recent market report event from Ray White Surfers Paradise Group.
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Over the last 12 months house prices in the city were observed to have grown 9 per cent compared to the national average of 8.5 per cent which industry experts highlighted as a “better capital return on investment than even Sydney”, which is “often named as one of the top cities in the world”.
Speaking on the conditions behind this meteoric growth, Ray White chief economist Nerida Conisbee said that “luxury continues to be the top performer, with the luxury housing market significantly outperforming the market as a whole”.
Citing a recent report that the network had seen 56 Gold Coast property sales over $5 million last year, Conisbee detailed that statistics have shown “there is substantially more money at the high end of the market”.
The chief economist further relayed that the Gold Coast market has become increasingly appealing as a luxury destination, highlighting the region’s increased dining and lifestyle options as drawing a comparison as “the Miami of Australia”.
Key to this growth has been interstate migration to the Gold Coast from Australia’s capital cities.
It also coincides with an increase in renovation and investment activity, which has led to a “lift in the quality of housing available”.
“There is a lot more investment in housing from people coming from Melbourne and Sydney, and either downsizing, or keeping a city apartment, and buying a larger home on the Gold Coast,” she detailed.
Chairman of Ray White White Surfers Paradise Group, Andrew Bell, expressed that the city’s surge in population growth was in part influenced by migrants’ desire to “escape” the COVID-19 pandemic and “get into a place where they felt they could enjoy that period of time better”.
Bell further explained that interest in the Gold Coast market has resulted in “continuous momentum”, wherein the family and friends of new Gold Coast residents also decide to buy into the market and attract their own new arrivals.
Demonstrating the extent of the city's growth, Bell cited the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics data, which recorded 19,170 new Gold Coast arrivals in the period up to 30 June 2023, and expressed that the city is on track to “hit the million population bracket” by 2037.
Conisbee relayed that the post-pandemic Gold Coast market has “fully recovered and continues to experience strong price growth”.
Bell echoed this sentiment and described the city as “a world-class city to live in” which is “fully mature in terms of shopping, schools and employment”.
“The Gold Coast might once have been a place you would only buy a holiday home, but now we are seeing a belief in the region like never before,” he concluded.