In 1980, the average house price was around $76,500. By 1990, the number had more than doubled to $184,600. In 2000, you needed around $312,000 to purchase a property in Sydney, with the number increasing to $575,900 in 2010. Back in 1970, you could buy a house in Sydney for $18,700.
In 1970, you could buy a house in Sydney for $18,700, and in 1980, the average house price was around $76,500. By 1990, the average had more than doubled to $184,600. And in 2000, you needed about $312,000 to purchase a dwelling in Sydney, with the number rising to $575,900 in 2010.
In 1970, the median Sydney house price was $18,700, while in Melbourne, prices were just $12,800. Perth prices were relatively high at $17,500.
Across Australia's capital cities in 1976, median house prices looked like this: Sydney – $36,800. Canberra – $35,100. Melbourne – $32,900.
Average House Prices in Australia averaged 657.65 AUD Thousand from 2011 until 2023, reaching an all time high of 930.60 AUD Thousand in the first quarter of 2022 and a record low of 486.30 AUD Thousand in the third quarter of 2012. This page includes a chart with historical data for Australia Mean Dwelling Price.
Housing Costs In Australia
Housing in Australia is much more expensive than the UK.
Australia's two largest and most expensive housing markets—Sydney and Melbourne—remain out of reach for most home buyers, especially first-time home buyers. A 2022 report found that with median home values in each city topping $1 million, Sydney and Melbourne qualified as some of the least affordable cities worldwide.
In 1975, the median Sydney house price was $33,960, compared to the median household Income of $8273 – a multiple of 4.1, according to the LF Economics report. Prices remained fairly constant as a multiple of incomes until 1996 when lower interest rates sparked a phenomenal rise in home prices.
Australians are also earning a lot more now than we were back then; the average full time earnings in 1975 was $7,600 per year, today the annual average earnings exceed $72,000 per annum.
In 1962, land in Penrith in the western suburbs of Sydney (“Sydney's newest suburb”) could be purchased for £595. In today's dollars that would equate to just over $15,000.
The median house price in Perth increased from $52,050 in 1985 to $102,500 in 1989. Then boom begat the bust. The pressure of high interest rates, which hit record levels in 1989 of 17 per cent, financial excess and an international recession in the early 1990s brought property transactions down significantly.
The median price of a Sydney home over the three months to April 1990 was $237,000, across the city there was 12 sales at that price over the period, three of which were units and the remaining nine were houses.
As we mentioned above, the average adult wage back then was around $4100 in 1970, and the average Sydney house cost $18,700.
According to data from REIA, the median house price in Sydney as at December 1988 of $214,500 cost almost twice as much as Australia's second least affordable city, Melbourne ($122,000).
The average annual salary in Australia is $68,900 and $35.30 per hour. It is just the average salary for basic workers but skilled and experienced workers also earn around $108,980 annually. The average salary also varies depending on the field of work and the job role of workers.
What is a good salary in Australia? A good salary in Australia is $5,000 to $6,000 per month or $60,500 to $72,500 per year. The national average income is $60,500 per annum. If living in major cities like Melbourne and Sydney, expect to earn around $100,000 per year or more depending on your experience.
If you dreamed of making the white picket fence a reality, a new house would've cost approximately $6,296–about $95,017.97 today.
According to a Macquarie University paper in 2004, the average house price in Sydney in 1989 was $170,850.
Melbourne's median house price sits at about $1,023,000.
So when the average house price in Australia is compared with the United States, the numbers demonstrate a huge divide. It turns out that the cost of the average house price in the US is less than 1500 euros ($AU 2541) per square metre, but down under it's more than 5000 euros ($AU 8470) per square metre.
CoreLogic's analysis of 3,904 house and unit markets nationally found for houses, just 9.1% of suburbs were cheaper to buy than rent, down from 30.2% of suburbs this time last year. For units, just 16% of suburbs are cheaper to buy in than rent, down almost 30 percentage points (45.2%).