Will Australia’s house price recovery extend beyond Sydney and Melbourne?

June 9, 2026

According to Cotality’s daily residential value index, Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide have so far avoided the house price corrections of Sydney and Melbourne.

Will Australia’s house price recovery extend beyond Sydney and Melbourne?

PropTrack’s home price results for May also show that all three cities have avoided a slump, although growth has slowed significantly in each market.

Residential values of major capital cities

The question is, can Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide survive the devaluation of housing? Or will they eventually follow their older peers?

Trent Saunders at CBA published the following chart showing that median time to market has increased in Brisbane and Perth, although they both remain below other major markets:

“Housing market conditions were already losing momentum before the Budget, but there are signs that the slowdown has accelerated since the changes to negative gearing and the announcement of the CGT discount”, Sanders wrote.

“A lot of attention has been focused on the recent decline in house prices, as well as the decline in auction approval rates compared to 2025 levels. Although a range of other housing data also saw a slowdown”.

“One such metric is median time to market. After adjusting Cotality’s data for normal seasonal patterns, median time to market increased significantly in most capital cities in May (with the one exception of Adelaide)”.

“Perth has seen its seasonally adjusted time on market go from 11 days in April to 22 days in May. In Brisbane, it has increased from 20 days to 29 days”.

“Rises in Sydney and Melbourne started slightly earlier, consistent with the RBA’s interest rate hike, although it also moved higher in May”, Sanders wrote.

CBA does not expect Perth, Brisbane, and Adelaide to experience significant price reductions as a result. “Narrow Demand Supply Balance”.

“In contrast, the supply tightness in Sydney and Melbourne is not the same, so the market is more exposed to a pronounced slowdown”, Sanders argues.

“Population growth has been soft relative to new housing supply in NSW and Victoria, and prices were already falling ahead of the Budget”.

I personally believe that Brisbane is most likely to join Sydney and Melbourne in declining housing values as it is historically more expensive than other capital markets: