The Perth suburbs where house prices have soared in the past five years

House prices in all bar a dozen Perth suburbs are more expensive than five years ago, new data reveals.

Prices have risen most dramatically in Cottesloe, with the suburb’s median price jumping more than 50 per cent to $3 million in the five years ending December 2023, according to Domain data.

A string of beachside suburbs also made their way to the top 20 list of the strongest-growing suburbs in the same period, including Swanbourne (up 49.3 per cent), Sorrento (up 45.7 per cent) and Mullaloo (up 42.6 per cent).

Blue-chip suburbs near beaches recorded some of the strongest growth in Perth in the past five years. Cooloongup jumped 43.9 per cent to a median of $410,000, Waikiki grew 43.8 per cent to a median of $470,000 and Golden Bay increased 41.9 per cent to $467,000.

Perth’s overall median house price has risen from $547,630 since December 2018 to $742,390.

Herron Todd White director Chris Hinchcliffe said the growth in value in the wealthy western beachside suburbs was linked to consumer confidence in those areas.

He estimated around half of all sales in the area were being conducted off-market.

“These suburbs were oversold through 2014 to probably 2018, there was a lot of activity through there with plenty of stock coming to market, and it was really cheap,” he said.

“You could go in there and buy a knock-down job for $1.5 million. Whereas in recent years, people realised how cheap it was, jumped on the bandwagon and snapped up all that cheap stock.”

Hinchcliffe said investor activity in suburbs around Rockingham had driven the market higher.

“Suburbs like Cooloongup and Waikiki were considered secondary locations for a long time but because we’ve had such strong rental growth over the last couple of years, it’s actually the investors that have driven those markets,” he said.

“It’s all linked to rental return, a lot of east coast buyers agents have really drilled into those suburbs and that’s what’s caused a lot of that demand.

“It’s been quite astronomical and we’ve been battling to keep up with the growth in those areas.”

According to the latest data from REIWA, Perth’s median house sale price rose 0.8 per cent over the month.

The suburbs that saw the most house sale price growth in February were Como (up 4.1 per cent to $1,150,000), Two Rocks (up 2.9 per cent to $515,000), Southern River (up 2.6 per cent to $736,000), Armadale (up 2.6 per cent to $400,000) and Greenfields (up 2.3 per cent to $452,000).

Active listings rose slightly in February, settling at 3991 at the end of the month. This was 5.1 per cent higher than January but remained 43.6 per cent lower than a year ago.

Hart said properties were still coming to market in good numbers, but demand exceeded supply, keeping active listings low.

“A review of our data shows new listings for houses in the past 12 months were just 2.2 per cent below the five-year average and unit listings were 12.8 per cent higher,” he said.

“However, house sales by REIWA members have been 8.5 per cent higher than the five-year average, while unit sales have been 30.6 per cent higher. This is why active listings remain so low.

“At the moment new listings coming to market are slightly outpacing the number of sales, which is why we’re seeing active listings rise.”

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