Where Do Australian Retirees Prefer to Live? Not Capital Cities

Have you ever wondered where Australia's retirees prefer to hang their hat?

A review by CoreLogic of the ABS retiree population analysis highlighted 50 council areas nationally showing the highest proportion of residents aged at least 65 years of age.

And not one of the 50 council areas listed is located within a capital city.

With only 2,904 residents, the small council area of Queenscliffe on the Bellarine Peninsula in southern Victoria, recorded the highest proportion of retirees aged over 65 years (40.3%) according to the ABS population data.

"If we list all councils nationally by their proportion of residents aged at least 65, the first capital city area listed is Holdfast Bay in Adelaide with 23.1% of its residents at least 65 years old," research analyst Cameron Kusher said.

"Council areas within New South Wales and South Australia also dominate the list with each of these states having 13 entries on the list.”

The small council area of Quairading in Western Australia’s Wheat Belt region enjoyed the greatest house value growth over the year (+21.5%), followed by Shoalhaven in New South Wales (+15.3%).

Of the council areas that have recorded house value falls over the past year, the greatest falls have been recorded in Mount Remarkable in South Australia (-7.1%) and Flinders in Tasmania (-5.2%).

A further feature of Top 50 retiree area analysis was that these particular retiree-centric council areas tended to have significantly lower median house values than the individual state capital city housing markets.

Kusher said the revealing statistics could be due to retirees moving to areas where housing is more affordable in order to free-up capital for them to enjoy their retirement.

"It could also be out of necessity due to the high cost of housing within most capital cities," he said.

"The locations are also likely to be linked to lifestyle preferences, with a large number of the top council areas located in regional coastal areas.”

Looking at the value growth performance for houses across these top 50 regions, the data showed the general growth rate was lower than that of the larger capital cities - 31 of the 50 council areas listed saw house values rise over the past year.