Australian Home Values Fell 1.1% in September for a Sixth Straight Month, With Annual Growth at Zero

Australian dwelling values fell 1.1% in September, a sixth consecutive monthly decline, leaving annual growth at exactly 0.0% and the national median at AUD 899,236.

Australian dwelling values fell 1.1% in September 2026, the sixth consecutive monthly decline, according to the Home Value Index that Cotality released under embargo to 0:01am on Thursday 1 October 2026. The national median dwelling value now stands at AUD 899,236. The annual change came in at exactly 0.0%, and that zero is the most misleading number in the release.

A national average that describes almost nobody

Behind the flat annual figure sit eight capital cities moving in two different directions. Darwin values are up 11.9% over the year, Perth 10.1%, Hobart 7.0%, Adelaide 6.5% and Brisbane 5.9%. Against them, Sydney is down 7.0%, Melbourne 6.2% and Canberra 1.6%. An investor who bought in the two largest markets a year ago and an investor who bought in the smallest capital have had opposite years, and the national headline averages them into nothing.

The medians show how far apart these markets are in absolute terms. Sydney sits at AUD 1,198,596 and Darwin at AUD 633,431, with Brisbane at AUD 1,048,880, Perth at AUD 975,022, Adelaide at AUD 928,560, Canberra at AUD 861,744, Melbourne at AUD 780,550 and Hobart at AUD 741,496. Brisbane has become the second most expensive capital while still posting annual growth of 5.9%, and Melbourne now sits below both Adelaide and Canberra on the same list.

The decline is broadening, not narrowing

September was negative in seven of the eight capitals. Darwin was the single exception, up 0.4% on the month and 0.5% over the quarter. The steepest monthly falls came in Brisbane at 1.5% and Sydney at 1.4%, which means the weakness is no longer confined to the markets that have been falling for a year: Brisbane is still 5.9% higher than twelve months ago and fell faster in September than anywhere else.

The quarterly figures sharpen that point. Sydney is down 4.9% over three months, Brisbane and Perth 4.7% each, Melbourne 3.4%, Canberra 3.2%, Adelaide 2.7% and Hobart 1.2%. Perth, with the second strongest annual gain in the country at 10.1%, has given back 4.7% in a single quarter. The combined capitals fell 1.2% in September against 0.7% for the combined regional markets, so the smaller centres are holding up better than the cities for now.

What this means against our own Australian data

Our Australia row is deliberately not a per-square-metre figure, because no publisher issues one for Australian housing and we do not estimate what is not published. What we carry instead is a national average asking price of USD 471,613 per dwelling and an average asking rent of USD 1,920.82 a month, both from the same research house, both measured in September 2026, and both covering apartments and units only.

That series shows a 10.8% annual rise, which points the other way from Cotality's 0.0%, and the reason is methodological rather than contradictory. Ours is what sellers are asking for units in a national listings sample; Cotality estimates realised values across the whole dwelling stock, houses included, and detached houses are what has been falling hardest in Sydney and Melbourne. Asking prices also move later than valuations, because a seller lowers the price only after the market has already moved.

One rule matters more than any of these numbers for a foreign buyer. Australia currently restricts foreign purchases to new-build property, with established homes closed to foreign buyers for the 2025 to 2027 period in our data, so the falling established stock that produced the 1.1% is largely not available to buy. Transaction costs run at 7.3%, the effective tax on rental income for a foreign resident is 30%, and we score the market 61 on our bubble risk scale, in the elevated band. This is market reporting, not investment advice.

Sources: Cotality, Home Value Index, September 2026 data, embargoed to 1 October 2026 https://discover.cotality.com/hubfs/Article-Reports/COTALITY%20HVI%20OCT%202026%20FINAL.pdf

Market data: Australia