Australia’s least populated cities are now the fastest-growing

Of the 150 international cities analysed, 43 recorded price growth above 10 per cent over the year to Q1 2021, including Canberra, Hobart and Darwin.

Canberra stood out as the fastest-growing Australian city and the country’s only city in the top 20 – occupying the 17th spot – having recorded an annual growth rate of 15.7 per cent.

During the previous quarter, the capital city ranked a much lower 56th, with its growth rate at just 6.6 per cent.

Hobart followed in 23rd spot, with an annual growth rate of 13.8 per cent, while Darwin trailed in 41st position with strong growth of 10.8 per cent. Just a few spots behind stood Adelaide (44th spot) with growth of 9.8 per cent, while Perth came in 51st with an 8.9 per cent growth rate.

“Australia’s five least populated capital cities led the residential price growth over the past year, and all trended above the elevated average annual price growth across the 150 global cities,” Knight Frank’s head of residential research, Michelle Ciesielski, said.

“The increase in sales transactions demonstrates the commitment in the migration of people moving towards these smaller cities and regional areas, and many first home buyers have been in a better position to buy given the relative value compared to where they were previously living.”

Apart from more buyers, these smaller cities have also welcomed more renters, with vacancy rates falling from an average 2.4 per cent at the start of the pandemic, to a much lower 1.2 per cent.

“In these markets, we estimate the balance between supply and demand to be around 3 per cent, so there is already a significant shortage of stock with very little planned to be built in these cities in the coming years,” the researcher said.

Meanwhile, Sydney (8.6 per cent), Melbourne (6.4 per cent) and Brisbane (5 percent) ranked in the top 90 at 55, 70 and 89, respectively.

All Australian cities on Knight Frank’s most recent Global Residential Cities Index ranked higher compared with Q4 2020.

Other international cities in the top 20 included Izmir, Ankara and Istanbul in Turkey, Wellington and Auckland in New Zealand, Seoul in Korea, Halifax, Hamilton, Ottawa Gatineau and Montreal in Canada, Moscow and St Petersburg in Russia, Phoenix, San Diego, Seattle and Boston in the United States, Luxembourg in Luxembourg, Bratislava in Slovakia and Stockholm in Sweden.