New figures reveal Townsville is dominating regional Queensland for house sales

Townsville’s property market has gone up a gear, with the latest data showing the region dominating sales volumes and house prices skyrocketing.

Townsville’s property owners have thousands of reasons to smile as property prices continue to surge. Picture: Supplied.

Townsville was Queensland’s best performing regional area for house sales over the last quarter, with climbing property values expected to counter a long-term undervaluing of the city’s real estate.

That was the view of REIQ’s Townsville Zone Chair Ben Kingsberry, who has crunched the numbers of Real Estate Institute of Queensland and CoreLogic’s newly released property reports.

Across Queensland, the REIQ said median house prices climbed 3.88 per cent over the quarter, and 6.04 per cent over the year, with the healthy growth also extending to the unit market where the state median rose 3.4 per cent over the quarter or 8.11 per cent annually.

During the December quarter, Townsville nearly doubled its nearest regional competitor Toowoomba in registering 1104 house sales.

Townsville’s quarterly median sale price of $440,000 represents a 4.76 per cent jump in value, with CoreLogic’s report revealing a 10.1 per cent rise over the past year, and a hefty 37.8 per cent rise over the last five years.

Townsville's housing data in Corelogic's Regional Market Update for the December quarter. Picture: CoreLogic.

Mr Kingsberry said this latest property data reflected the underlying strength of Townsville’s property market, which continued to grow stronger thanks to competition between various buyer types.

“It’s extremely strong, (with) very high levels of demand, very high levels of attendance at open homes and lots of multiple offers.

REIQ’s Townsville Zone Chair Ben Kingsberry is upbeat about the strength of Townsville’s property market. Picture: Evan Morgan

“We’ve seen our highest quarterly growth period for a very long time in terms of the average price, so that would indicate that the market is accelerating rather than anything else

“We’ve got a lot of confidence in the Townsville market in the coming years.”

Townsville also remains one of Queensland’s fastest moving markets, with houses selling within 21 days, just surpassed by Ipswich and Toowoomba (both at 18 days), and Bundaberg, Cairns and Logan at 20 days.

Mr Kingsberry said Townsville’s unit sales performed even better over the last quarter, with a 5.29 per cent increase recorded after 272 units were sold, finishing behind Mackay’s 7.59 per cent growth.

“We’re seeing a real trend at the moment that there’s people out there who may have intended to buy a house but they’re finding that the rise in prices of houses and interest rates has made that unachievable, so they’ve … moved into the unit market,” he said.

“A lot of first home buyers are starting out in the unit market, rather than going straight to a house.”

With Townsville’s average property prices being consistently lower compared to other regional cities like Cairns and Mackay, Mr Kingberry believed the local market was still “significantly undervalued” and values would continue to rise over the next two to three years.

“The reason that we see years of strength ahead of us, is that the underlying value in our market is much higher than where it sits right now.”

REIQ chief executive Antonia Mercorella said while these prices were a cause for celebration for property owners when it comes time to sell, it could be frustrating and disheartening for buyers trying to enter or transition into the market.

“We’re still in a position where the shortage of supply is driving the market and we’re lacking the housing diversity we need for everyone in our community – the critical gap of course is at the affordable end of the market,” she said.

Originally published as New figures reveal Townsville is dominating regional Queensland for house sales