Australian Property Market – Prices, Trends, Forecast [May 2026]

Sydney

• Market performance: Sydney’s market performance softened as dwelling values retreated and the city sat below its recent peak, showing a clearer loss of momentum than several other capitals.
• Key Insights: A notable feature is the widening gap between price tiers, as demand has concentrated in lower-value segments while more expensive Sydney homes have faced greater pressure.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Sydney

Melbourne

• Market Performance: Melbourne’s housing market showed softer performance, with dwelling values easing across the month and quarter while remaining modestly higher over the year relative to its earlier market peak.
• Key Insights: The city’s conditions reflect affordability and serviceability pressures, rising advertised supply, and rental growth that is now outpacing value growth, contributing to a more cautious market setting.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Melbourne

Brisbane

• Market Performance: In Brisbane, market performance held firm even as national momentum eased, with dwelling values continuing to rise across the short-term measures shown in the report.
• Key Insights: A closer reading points to demand clustering in more accessible parts of the city, particularly across Logan, Ipswich, northern and southern suburban markets.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Brisbane

Adelaide

• Market Performance: Adelaide’s market held its ground through April, with dwelling values continuing to rise over the recent month, quarter and year even as the broader capital-city upswing lost some pace.
• Key Insights: Beneath the citywide result, stronger local growth was spread across northern, central, hills and southern pockets, pointing to varied demand rather than a single concentrated source of momentum.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Adelaide

Perth

• Market Performance: Perth’s housing market kept advancing more firmly than most capitals, even as the report points to a clear softening from its earlier pace.
• Key Insights: Within the broader market, demand appears concentrated in more attainable price segments, with tight inventory and supply constraints still supporting values despite weaker national conditions.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Perth

Canberra

• Market Performance: In Canberra, the market moved with a quiet steadiness, sitting apart from the sharper capital-city shifts while still showing some underlying support across the broader reporting period.
• Key Insights: What stands out is the patchwork feel: houses, units, local districts and rents did not all pull the same way, leaving a market that reads more mixed than weak.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Canberra

Hobart

• Market performance: Hobart’s dwelling market recorded continued growth across the main measurement periods, with houses contributing more consistently than units despite a broader national slowdown in momentum.
• Key insights: Within Greater Hobart, outer and suburban areas featured more prominently among stronger-performing local markets, suggesting demand was not concentrated solely in the inner-city core.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Hobart

Darwin

• Market performance: Darwin’s housing market kept moving ahead in April, not dramatically, but with enough breadth across dwellings to place it among the stronger capital-city results in the report.
• Key insights: Across rentals, Darwin stood out for elevated rental appreciation and comparatively high yields, indicating persistent rental tightness alongside sustained investor-relevant income conditions.

Read More: Latest Property Market Update for Darwin

Australian Property Market Trends

Here are the key takeaways from the latest value trends across capitals and regions, showing long-term growth, recent momentum, and where each market sits in the cycle.

• The national housing market is sitting at its peak, with values unchanged from the April 2026 high and up 37.6% over five years and 76.4% over 10 years.
• Regional markets have materially outperformed the combined capitals over both five- and 10-year horizons, rising 51.1% and 102.6% respectively, compared with 33.7% and 69.3% across the capitals.
• Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth remain among the strongest capital-city markets, each sitting at peak levels and recording five-year gains of more than 75%.
• Perth has delivered the strongest five-year capital-city performance, with values up 92.1%, narrowly ahead of Brisbane at 84.0% and Adelaide at 77.4%.
• Brisbane leads the capital cities over the 10-year period, with values up 119.5%, followed by Adelaide at 111.4% and Perth at 107.5%.
• Melbourne continues to lag the major capitals, sitting 2.3% below its March 2022 peak and recording the weakest five-year growth at 5.8%.
• Sydney remains only modestly below its November 2025 peak, with values down 1.0%, but its longer-term performance remains solid, with gains of 21.4% over five years and 59.8% over 10 years.
• Regional Queensland, Regional Tasmania, Regional South Australia and Regional Western Australia have all more than doubled in value or come close to doing so over the past decade.
• Darwin stands out as the weakest 10-year performer, with values up 27.2%, despite currently sitting at its April 2026 peak.
• The data points to a market where recent momentum remains broad-based, but the strongest medium- and long-term growth has been concentrated in regional areas and the more affordable, high-growth capital cities.

Australian Property Market Forecast

Australian housing values are likely to keep losing momentum, with the market shifting from broad-based growth toward flatter conditions and selective declines. Sydney and Melbourne appear most exposed as affordability pressures, weaker sentiment and rising listings give buyers more leverage, while stronger markets such as Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide may continue to rise, but at a slower pace.

The key drag is the squeeze on borrowing capacity from higher rates, elevated living costs and stretched household budgets. Even so, a sharp national downturn looks unlikely while rental markets remain tight, new housing supply stays constrained and employment conditions support household income. The result is likely to be a more uneven market, where lower-priced homes and supply-constrained regions hold up better than expensive, rate-sensitive segments.

The Australian banks forecast:

• • ANZ predicts a 5-6% increase in capital city property prices in 2024, with Brisbane expected to see the highest rise at 9-10%, Perth property values could go up by 1-11%, Sydney by 4-5%, and Melbourne prices by 2-3%.

• • CBA forecasts a 5% rise in capital city prices, with some variations: Brisbane is anticipated to grow by 6%, Melbourne and Perth by 5%, Sydney by 4%, and Adelaide by 1%.

• • NAB projects a 5.4% average increase across the capitals, with Brisbane expected to see a 6.5% rise, Perth and Adelaide by 6.2%, Melbourne by 5.5%, Sydney by 5%, and Hobart remaining flat.

• • Westpac expects a 6% growth across the combined capitals, with Perth leading at 10%, followed by Brisbane at 8%, Sydney at 6%, Adelaide at 4%, and Melbourne at 3%

For the second half of 2024 this means:

• Modest value increases expected: The national housing market is likely to see modest value increases through the end of 2024, driven by a persistent imbalance between supply and demand.

• Affordability constraints: Affordability pressures, high interest rates, and cost-of-living challenges are expected to temper growth, especially in higher-priced markets.

• Sustainability of growth: High growth levels in cities like Perth, Adelaide, and Brisbane may be difficult to sustain as affordability becomes more stretched.

• Shift to affordable segments: Demand is increasingly focused on more affordable market segments, with significant growth in the lower quartile of the market.

• Construction Sector Constraints: Ongoing issues in the construction sector, including labor shortages and competition from public infrastructure projects, are likely to keep supply constrained, supporting property values in the longer term.

Australian Property Clock Update

Each month, independent property valuation firm Herron Todd White (HTW) publishes a residential property report that assesses the performance of Australia’s 50 largest markets. HTW’s Property Clock grades each market based on current and predicted performance to determine whether it’s rising, falling, peaking or bottoming out.

Houses Clock Key Takeaways

Units Clock Key Takeaways 

• The national units market is broadly weighted toward growth, with many locations sitting in the rising market phase.

• Rising markets include several major and regional centres such as Adelaide, Brisbane, Darwin, Gold Coast, Hobart, Perth, Mackay, Rockhampton, Townsville and Wodonga.

• A smaller group is approaching peak of the market, including Gladstone, Mildura, Port Hedland, Shepparton, Sunshine Coast and Whitsunday.

• Peak of market locations include Bundaberg, Burnie/Devonport, Mount Gambier, Sydney and Toowoomba. Sydney is shown in blue, indicating its position has changed from last month.

• Starting to decline markets are limited to Alice Springs, Bathurst and Launceston, suggesting only a few unit markets are beginning to lose momentum.

• Port Macquarie is positioned as approaching bottom of market, indicating weaker conditions but potentially nearing the end of its downturn phase.

• Ballina/Byron Bay and Southern Highlands are at the bottom of market, suggesting these unit markets are at the lowest point in the cycle.

• Canberra, Central Coast, Geelong, Lismore, Melbourne and Newcastle are in start of recovery, pointing to early signs of improvement after softer conditions.

• Overall, the units clock suggests stronger momentum across many affordable and regional markets, while only a handful of locations are shown as declining or near the bottom of the cycle.

Conclusion

Market conditions are shifting into a more cautious, selective phase, as stretched affordability, weaker confidence and higher borrowing costs cool buyer demand, most clearly in Sydney and Melbourne. Still, this is not a uniform slowdown. Tight supply, low rental vacancies and solid performance across many regional markets and mid-sized capitals continue to put a floor under values. From here, the market looks more likely to lose speed than fall sharply, with results shaped by where a property sits, its price bracket and which buyers are still active.