South East Queensland’s top affordable home locations

Recent data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics on the average loan for a first home buyer in Australia was $418,214 with an average deposit of $104,554, according to Finder. This means the average first home buyer will be looking at the sub-$550,000 price range where incentives and grants may be available.

For those hunting a home under $550,000, this market can be challenging – particularly close to Brisbane or the pristine Sunshine Coast.

“It’s very difficult to find affordable properties in Queensland and particularly on the coast,” says Cameron Kusher, executive manager – economic research at REA Group. “There has been a lot of purchasing of new house and land stock and prices have been rising fast.”

Kusher adds that preferences to have more rooms and outdoor space have surged during the COVID-19 pandemic, adding to the competitive environment. Regional locations with coastal lifestyles have also become top of the list for buyers.

“The fact that a lot of people are working remotely has really helped make buying near the coast quite a lot more attractive,” Kusher says.

There are still some areas where three or four-bedrooms could be snapped up under $550,000, Kusher says, suggesting that north of Brisbane in Caloundra at the foot of the Sunshine Coast, or Caboolture or Morayfield are good places to look – but they could just take a little more effort to find.

Mapping South East Queensland’s affordable areas

To help you track down opportunities under $550,000, realestate.com.au has created an interactive map, highlighting areas that typically have sales of houses and units in this price bracket. You’ll see that the dark red areas show where the most sales under this amount have taken place either in the year to end-of-June 2020 or end-of-June 2021.