Gold Coast Enters Luxury Market Hit List

The Gold Coast is the newest entry on to a list of international high-end property markets, with a strengthening pipeline of new projects attracting affluent local and interstate buyers.

Demand for prestige real estate in the Gold Coast has pushed it on to the Prime Global Cities Index, entering the list at 27.

The quarterly prime residential index, published by Knight Frank, measures the top 5 per cent of a city’s housing market.

The Gold Coast joins Queensland’s capital on the list, with Brisbane tracking ahead of Melbourne in terms of luxury home price growth over the year.

Brisbane’s 2.2 per cent annual price growth had it place at number 20 on the list, just in front of Melbourne — at 21 — which grew 2.1 per cent over the year.

Despite suffering significant house price declines over the last year, Sydney’s prime market remained resilient and grew a healthy 2.5 per cent.

“Prime property performance in Sydney is now in the sixth year of positive annual growth, averaging a remarkable 8.7 per cent growth over this time,” Knight Frank head of residential research Michelle Ciesielski said.

“This outstrips the average of 1.8 per cent recorded the six years prior [making it] the best prestige performer in Australasia.”

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Prime Global Cities Index

^Knight Frank Q2 Prime Global Cities Index. Ranked by annual % change.

Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane’s high-end real estate markets all registered annual growth above the annual 1.4 per cent global average. The only other Australian cities on the list, Perth and the Gold Coast, grew a more moderate 0.6 per cent and 1.1 per cent respectively.

Knight Frank’s latest wealth report, published in June, showed Sydney’s high-end house prices are the highest on record at $27,244 a square metre.

Ciesielski said Sydney also achieved its top residential price in 2018.

“At an estimated A$76,919 per square metre (US$54,149 per sq m), which was the fourth highest price achieved out of the 10 cities examined.”

Luxury home prices registered subdued growth across the board, with interest rates edging lower in some of the world’s largest economies and sluggish global economic growth affecting residential markets.

The Federal Reserve in the US cut interest rates for the first time in more than a decade, while Australia, New Zealand and Russia have all cut interest rates to record lows.