Cotality says Australian home values rose another 1.0% in November 2025, marking the third straight month in a row where they’ve increased by 1.0% or more.
The data house says the pace of growth has moderated slightly, easing from 1.1% in October.
However, the national headline figure disguises a two-speed property market.
Prices are accelerating in Perth, Brisbane, Adelaide, Darwin, Hobart and Canberra, while affordability pressures are slowing growth in Australia’s two largest cities - Sydney and Melbourne.
The details
Cotality says home values rose 1.0% in November 2025 and 7.5% over the past year, meaning the median Australian home is now worth $888,941, or $978,077 if the home is located in a capital city.
The data analytics firm says growth slowed slightly from the 1.1% recorded in October, weighed down by Australia’s two largest cities, with Sydney values rising 0.5% in November and Melbourne up a modest 0.3%.
The pace of growth in the two big cities slowed notably from October, when Melbourne recorded 0.9% and Sydney 0.7%.
On the other hand, growth sped up in every other capital city in November, positively exploding in Perth with a stunning 2.4% surge.
Cotality’s Research Director, Tim Lawless, notes that growth in home values in smaller cities is once again diverging from Sydney and Melbourne - a similar trend to the one seen in late 2023 and 2024.
The boom in Perth has seen the median home price in the WA capital break through the $900k barrier in just 30 days, to hit a new record of $914,229.
“The skew towards the mid-sized capitals is especially evident in Perth, where listings are holding more than 40% below average, buyer demand is elevated, and the 2.4% monthly rise in dwelling values has added just over $21,000 to the median in November, roughly $5,000/week,” Mr Lawless says.
A big monthly jump of 1.9% in November has seen Brisbane values break through the $1,000,000 mark, with the median home in the Queensland capital now worth an astonishing $1,015,767.
Homes have increased in value by just under 13% in Brisbane over the last year.
Adelaide and Darwin also recorded very strong growth of 1.9% during the month, with the median home price in the South Australian capital now $891,004 - just $600 less than Canberra.
Cotality says the lower monthly gain in Sydney (0.5%) in November may reflect affordability constraints putting a ceiling on growth.
Mr Lawless points to the fact that Sydney has a smaller supply deficit, with listings of homes for sale tracking just 2.2% below the five-year average for this time of the year.
Compare this to the wider capital city benchmark, where listings are about 16% below average.
While most markets gained price momentum through Spring, he says Sydney’s monthly growth rate looks to have peaked at 0.9% in August 2025.
The easing in value growth comes as auction clearance rates have trended lower since peaking in mid-September, falling below the decade average by mid-November.
Sydney and Melbourne have seen clearance rates hold in the low 60% range through the second half of the month.
Cotality’s Tim Lawless also points to record levels of housing unaffordability as another factor slowing growth in the two big cities.
Cotality recently released affordability metrics, which showed a record high in the national dwelling value to household income ratio (the median dwelling value is 8.2 times higher than the annual pre-tax household income) and near record levels of household income required to service a mortgage at the median value (45.0%).
“With housing affordability already stretched and worsening, it stands to reason that fewer borrowers will be able to access credit as serviceability barriers become more prominent,” Mr Lawless says.
“We can already see the flow-through effect from such stretched affordability and serviceability measures, with growth in housing values skewed towards lower price points of the market.
“Over the past three months, most of the state capitals have seen values across the lower quartile of the market rising the fastest.
“Melbourne, where housing affordability isn’t quite as stretched, is the one exception, with the city’s broad middle-of-the-market seeing the fastest lift in values.”
Tim Lawless says another demand-side factor that might weigh on housing growth is the rebound in inflation, as well as the widely held expectation that interest rates won't be cut further anytime soon.
“With inflation once again above the RBA’s target range and rates potentially on hold for the foreseeable future, it's likely housing sentiment will suffer,” he says.
Tim Lawless says the recent guidance issued by the banking regulator to lending institutions is unlikely to have much impact on the property market.
APRA has told banks they must limit high debt-to-income (DTI) ratio loans to 20% of new lending.
However, Mr Lawless notes that the majority of recent new mortgages were issued with a debt-to-income ratio of less than six.
“This new credit policy won't be implemented until February next year, but even then, it's likely to only affect the margins of borrowing activity,” he says.
Rental market
Cotality says rental markets also remain extremely tight, with no sign of vacancy rates loosening.
The firm says the past four months have seen national rental vacancy rates holding close to record lows at just 1.5%, down from 1.9% a year ago.
Rents are also continuing to rise, with Cotality’s national rental index rising half a per cent in November to be 5.0% higher over the past year.
Dwelling rents are rising across every capital city, with Darwin and Hobart leading the annual gains, while Melbourne, Canberra and Adelaide have seen the smallest increases.
Cotality says rental growth is skewed towards the apartment market in most capitals, as that’s generally where the median rental rate is lower.
The outlook
Given those worsening affordability constraints and near record low rental vacancy rates, Cotality Research Director Tim Lawless says government incentives for first home buyers - like the Albanese government’s First Home Guarantee - are likely to remain popular.
While firm data on the take-up of these incentives is “thin on the ground”, he says it's clear that “prices are rising more rapidly across the lower price points of the market, where first-home buyer demand is most concentrated.”
“Although these demand-side policies help to temporarily boost home ownership, they do nothing to address housing affordability in the long run.”
Cotality expects values to continue rising through 2026, but Mr Lawless says the pace of gains is likely to slow as affordability and serviceability factors put a ceiling on how high housing prices can go.