Beyond the beach

But a quiet revolution is taking place in the country's interior. What's driving this inland boom, and which areas are emerging as the new hotspots?

Over the past decade, the Gold Coast has been the strongest regional growth area in Australia, with all top performing areas being located in either the Gold Coast or Sunshine Coast. The top performer has been the Mermaid Beach-Broadbeach area where the median has increased from $1.1 million to $2.5 million.

While there is no inland regional area that has seen an increase so marked over the past decade, there are many areas that have more than doubled and the majority of them are in regional inland New South Wales and Victoria. The strongest inland regional area over the past 10 years has been the Southern Highlands in regional New South Wales. Bowral tops the list with an increase of $1 million over the past decade. The Victorian spa country also features with Woodend and Daylesford seeing increases in excess of $460,000.

While the Southern Highlands and Victorian spa country have topped the list over the long term, Toowoomba and surrounding areas account for nine of the top 10 growth areas over the past year.

Middle Ridge in Toowoomba has seen price growth of just over $100,000 over the past year and is now getting close to a million dollar median. While it has taken a bit longer for Toowoomba to see strong price growth similar to Brisbane, Sunshine Coast and Gold Coast, it appears that this is now occurring. The only suburb far from Toowoomba on the list is Tanunda in South Australia’s Barossa. The median has increased by just under $75,000 over the past year.