Thomas Merriman

Sydney’s Upper North Shore suburbs have long been regarded as the ‘leafy’ and ‘affluent’ suburbs of Sydney. Outside of the Eastern suburbs and the sloped, water-fronted, old-money hills of the lower north shore, the Upper North Shore has survived in wealth by its predominantly larger block sizes and healthy education system – and a bit of old money too.
But, do you know the important statistics about your Upper North Shore suburb? Here are some facts below, compliments of CoreLogic RPData.

Wahroonga:
In May 2013 the median sale price in Wahroonga was a healthy $1,188,000 it’s amazing that even in 2013 a house above $1M was considered a ‘mansion’ where the median price of property cleared at Auction across Sydney, not just wealthy suburbs, is over $1M. It is important to note that in January of 2013 median prices were in the $900,000’s.
Currently, as late as May 2015, the median sale price in Wahroonga is $1,400,000 but, as recently as March 2015 the median was a staggering $1,600,000.

Pymble:
Pymble has always had a healthy reputation for sustainable and continuously high sale prices across the board – It is evident when looking at historical data on sale prices. From the same period as above, the growth in Pymble is far more noticeable since May 2013, where the median sale price was $1,310,000 to May 2015 where the median sale price jumped to $2,020,000 and has been consistently around or above $1,900,000 for the last 6 or so months.

Turramurra:
What is amazing is that when we look at Turramurra, the Median sale price in May 2013 was similar to Wahroonga at the same time at $1,170,000 but in May 2015 the median price is similar to Pymble at $2,000,000. It would seem that the Growth in Wahroonga is more sustainable and the growth in Pymble has been far greater. However, the evidence in Turramurra would suggest that it has become a more popular suburb to live seeing such a dramatic increase, which has been very incremental, gradually increasing over the time period.

St Ives:
St Ives is an interesting suburb to look at because in February 2013 the median sale price was $1,307,500 whereas March 2013 was $995,000 and in May 2013 it was $1,112,750, which seems to be a dramatic back-flip.
However, in February 2014, roughly a year later it was $1,295,000 and only grew slightly and back-tracked regularly all year until January 2015 at $1,580,000, dropping in February to $1,491,500 and presently, as of May 2015 to $1,732,000.
St Ives may fluctuate a little more than the other suburbs covered as it is a little further away from main requirements for transport i.e. Train and highway City buses. However, with current pricing hype and central shopping locations, sporting amenities and good schools, St Ives may be finally seeing the growth the rest of the Upper North Shore has had over previous years.

This outline can act as an indicator for people looking to buy, sell or invest in Sydney’s Upper North Shore.
Although this spike has been quite dramatic it may not be sustainable short-term, however, long term we have always seen growth naturally in the Upper North Shore outside of other market activity, which is good.

Thomas Merriman.