Young Aussie reveals why she left Sydney as city experiences mass exodus
It was once seen as the city almost every young Aussie wanted to be in, now Gen Zers and Millennials are fleeing in droves for one brutal reason.
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As Gen Zers and Millennials continue to flee Sydney in droves, one young Aussie has revealed exactly what made her ditch the harbourside city.
Llani Belle moved to Sydney in 2019 and recently relocated to the Gold Coast after four and a half years of living in the city’s eastern suburbs.
One of the major factors in her decision to move was the worsening rental crisis and soaring cost of living, which she described as “just so ridiculous”.
The 28-year-old sells courses in the real estate space and, while she still travels back to the city often for work, she said commuting when she needs to makes more sense for her than continuing to live there.
Llani told news.com.au that shortly after moving to Sydney it became apparent the lifestyle she wanted to live wasn’t going to be affordable in the long term.
She described it as a city you “pay to live in”, rather than going there to be able to get ahead in life.
“In Sydney I never thought, no matter how much money I had, I was ever able to get in front because everything was so expensive and everything kept on going up,” she said.
“There are other places in Australia that’s so big and so beautiful that you can have similar experiences but not have to be spending that much money.”
Over the last year and a half was when she really started to notice the pinch of the increased cost of living.
“It is a really hard city to live in,” she said.
“I think when I started to work remotely is when I was like, ‘Well, what am I still doing here if I don’t physically have to be here all the time’.”
So she packed up and moved to the Gold Coast and is now living in an apartment that she says would be triple the price in an equivalent Sydney suburb.
Growing up in a small town, Llani experienced a lot of culture shocks after moving to the city, with the biggest change she struggled to come to terms with being the traffic.
“Every single day it’s a fight to be able to get anywhere. I guess the convenience of life isn’t there. Nothing is convenient, but being in a small town, everything is convenient. And so that’s massive culture shock,” she said.
In a TikTok video she made on the subject, the 28-year-old described how something as simple as forgetting a few items from the grocery store could turn into an ordeal.
“I have to walk to my car that I parked in the side street because my apartment, although I paid a ridiculous amount of money for, didn’t have car parks,” she said.
“I would then have to fight through traffic and drive into a multi-level car park and then pay, on average, 15 per cent more than the average shop because of the area that I lived in.”
Another factor in Llani’s decision to leave the city was the people, revealing Sydney “hardened” her a lot and that before moving she was a very open and giving person.
“I moved there for an opportunity and I think a lot of people do the same, and when you’re in the opportunistic mindset, it’s a constant thought process of how you can leverage off of what’s in your surroundings, versus just enjoying the people around you and enjoying the people that you meet,” she told news.com.au, adding that many people lack authenticity as a result.
“It’s just a bit more of that hustle and grind, dog eat dog world. That is what I at least noticed. I also worked in real estate when I was there, so that is that on steroids.”
Since moving to Queensland, she had noticed that people are a lot calmer and more positive, noting there are small differences that stick out, like going to a cafe and people taking the time to stop and talk to you.
“I think that Sydney is so deeply rooted in that fast paced lifestyle and mindset that if you were to stop when you were getting served and be like ‘Hi, how are you?’ it was like people would have a system malfunction in their brain because they’re not used to slowing down and responding to how they are,” she said.
“It’s just like constant, every single day is jam packed from 5am to 10pm and then you rinse and repeat the following day. I think it’s a city full of people like that.”
While Llani decided to leave Sydney behind, she can still understand why people are drawn to the city and the opportunities it can present, however, she ultimately found the lifestyle unsustainable – and she is far from the only one.
A recent report by the NSW Productivity Commission found that between 2016 and 2021, Sydney lost twice as many people as it gained.
It found around 35,000 people moved to the city, but 70,000 chose to leave.
About two of every three departures from Sydney are from those aged between 25 and 64, a number the report said shows it’s not just “grey-nomads” and retirees exiting the city.
Last year, 22-year-old woman, Skye, moved to Brisbane after five years living in Sydney.
“I moved because of the cost of living pretty much. I was just spending so much money on rent and food and everything. Just the cost of being in Sydney,” she told news.com.au.
“When I started looking at Brisbane rental prices, I was like, why am I spending so much on an old apartment living in the CBD when I could have a whole big house in Brisbane?”
The move saw her go from living in an $800-a-week two-bedroom property with a roommate in Sydney’s CBD, to splitting a $600 a week three-bedroom house with a backyard with two roommates.
Former NITV and ABC journalist Jennetta Quinn-Bates also announced last year that she was ditching the city in response to soaring rents.
Taking to X, formerly Twitter, she said she was fed up of paying some else’s mortgage, revealing a number of people in her apartment building had been hit with brutal rent increases.
“So many people in my building have moved out or been hit with $100-400 per week rent increases,” she wrote.
“Landlords are just giving three months’ notice so they can up everything.
“I’m going to miss Sydney. I’ve loved it here in Potts Point! But, I am really disheartened by the way people are being treated, people of all ages, the young, the elderly and in between.”
Originally published as Young Aussie reveals why she left Sydney as city experiences mass exodus
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