Real estate Sydney, NSW: How much homes are worth in every suburb

A study across every NSW suburb showed home values haven’t fallen everywhere since rates began rising and in some areas they’re soaring. See what homes are worth in your area

Homeowners in pockets of Sydney left in the cold during last year’s housing boom have seen rises in the value of their properties in recent months as the rest of the market plummets back to earth.

A study detailing home value movements in every NSW postcode showed values have not fallen everywhere since the Reserve Bank began raising interest rates earlier this year.

Amid what’s become a deepening downturn for the market as a whole, clusters of strong activity have emerged where home values have climbed by up to 24 per cent in three months.

It has meant buyers are paying an average of more than $100,000 higher than they were in June.

Josh Brett and Bella Rousis are taking their Matraville home to auction this weekend. Picture: Sam Ruttyn

The suburbs where values continued to grow were mostly cheaper western areas or rare eastern pockets where prices were lower than in neighbouring areas, according to the PropTrack valuations data.

Many didn’t have the extreme rises in prices typical of the market last year, when Covid lockdowns and rock bottom interest rates fuelled an unprecedented price boom.

“Affordability is a key driver in this market,” said PropTrack economist Paul Ryan. “As rates go up and people’s borrowing power has dropped, they go for what’s still affordable.”

My Housing Market economist Andrew Wilson said another reason the lower end of the market was weathering the current downturn better was because it was attracting a bigger mix of buyers.

This included investors, who have been encouraged by record rises in rents. Rising rents have in turn encouraged some tenants to bite the bullet and become homebuyers, Mr Wilson said.

Both these buyers typically competed for lower priced properties, and the increased competition put upwards pressure on prices.

Recent growth areas included new Blacktown suburbs Nirimba Fields and Melonba, where house values lifted 6-12 per cent. Houses in these suburbs were about $200,000 cheaper than the Sydney average.

Apartment value rises were even larger in some pockets of the Hills and southwest, with the average value of Quakers Hill units increasing nearly 18 per cent, while Edmonson Park’s rise was about 14 per cent.

The 24 per cent jump in the value of Rouse Hill units was the largest among any property category in Sydney and the country over the period.

It’s come as the rest of the market continues to move in the opposite direction: just over three quarters of suburbs had a drop in house values and more than 90 per cent had a drop in unit values.

Units in Rouse Hill has the biggest growth in value for a housing category in Sydney.

Most of the falls were marginal at below 3 per cent, but there were areas where unit values plummeted more than 10 per cent, including Bondi Junction, Randwick, Kensington and Woollahra, in the east.

House values in Artarmon, Willoughby and Lane Cove, on the north shore, and in Ashfield, in the inner west, fell 6-7 per cent.

But the biggest drops in value were recorded in the suburbs around the coming Western Sydney Airport, such as Kemps Creek, Bringelly and Austral, where land speculating was rampant in recent years.

Average value drops of up to $630,000 in this region was largely the result of lower speculative spending and some of the original land plots being subdivided into much smaller lots.

SQM Research director Louis Christopher noted that in more established areas the properties that had the biggest drops in value were usually priced between $1.5 million and $3 million.

“They’re the type of houses that were a stretch for upper middle income earners to get when rates were low, but now there’s far less buyers in the market place who can pay that because rates have gone up,” Mr Christopher said.

Source: PropTrack.

McGrath Coogee agent Charles Stevens said the properties fetching the same prices as last year, or in some cases higher, tended to be fully renovated homes that ticked all the boxes for buyers.

“There are a lot of properties on the market where the kitchens and bathrooms are 30 years old and there’s a lot of work needed. For some buyers that’s not so appealing because building costs are going up and it’s difficult to get a tradie,” he said.

“There is also a fair bit of money still going around. Plenty of people cashed out of the market by selling last year. They got huge prices and are waiting to buy back in. Their borrowing capacity may have dropped but they have $750,000 or $800,000 cash behind them so it doesn’t affect them as much.”

Joshua Brett and Bella Rousis are taking their four-bedroom house on Jersey Rd in Matraville to auction Saturday at 12:45pm. Mr Brett said they were feeling confident about the sale because they were in an affordable pocket of the eastern suburbs that’s relatively close to the water.

“The area seems to have held up pretty well,” Mr Brett said. “The prices aren’t insane here like in places like Bondi so the blowback hasn’t been as much.

“It’s still a pretty up and coming place and its close to the beach, where it seems many people still want to buy.”

Originally published as Real estate Sydney, NSW: How much homes are worth in every suburb