It's all relative to where you live of course. If you are in the city - one of the bigger ones I'd say the average would be around the $400 000 mark. If you are rural, in my area, the average would be around $200 000 or less.
My mortgage 10 years ago was $70 000 in a rural area.
Like all averages, there are some huge variances to get that average.
I was going to say around 300 000 Aust wide. I lived in a small town on the East coast & the low end was 220 000 - 300 000, but here in a small South WA town, the priciest house in town is $130 000. There's a cheaper one here for only 60 000 & its not a bad place.
I would like to point out that, yes, house prices might seem higher in some areas, but also that a lot of houses in my area that young couples purchase are not the typical "first home" fare. +study, +separate dining, +family room/rumpus/2nd living area, +2 door garage, +ensuite, +extra bedroom(s) are all features that are not found in starter-uppers. Interestingly though, many young people now expect their first home to have some or all of these features (AND be pretty too). In the meantime, developers & investors come through snapping up all the more modest homes, slap a cheap facelift on them, then onsell or rent at an inflated cost while laughing all the way to the bank.
I blame those bloody home renovation tv shows for selling us all a dream that is bankrupting the nation's affordable housing stock [/RANT].
We are rural in a crappy old farm house, so our mortgage is only $140k, will go up to $300k when we rebuild on this block. Which is probably on par with the area and a reasonable home.
MD: this is what is happening 2 houses down. there was this 1 bedroom run-down victorian that the owners sold for about $550k!! INSANE. all the young coupkes came through, but it was too exxy for what it was so now we have 'professional renovators' that got it and are flipping it. now they will sell it for something in the mid 700k mark...kinda sucks to see ppl getting pushed out of the market like that by crazy housing prices.
back to OP...i would think that $400k would be pretty average for melbourne?? we are about that and had a 25% deposit for our 2 bdr place.
I would say around $300-350 is average. When we buy i won't be going over $320, I still want to be able to pay a mortgage off without eating tins of baked beans for the rest of my life! Where we would be looking you can still get a nice 3 bedroom home for around that. We live about 50km from the CBD, but we have everything here, shopping centers, train station, freeway, lakes.
Astrid i hear you. We live in a crappy old farm house. Decision is do wd renovate or rebuild. Both will cost around $300000
We live in a crappy old house on acres too. I just can't at this point justify bumping our mortgage up to rebuild. Our current mortgage is well under what I would think is average. Most people we know have between 350-400k as the average.
As N2L said, there is a difference between mortgage amount and house prices. I think I read recently that the average mortgage is somewhere in the 300s (don't remember the exact amount). Yes, some areas are much more expensive, but as others have said, I guess you'd generally expect that people buying in those areas have much more deposit to put towards it.
Some hard facts, from The Year Book, 2012:
Average loan for first home buyers $281,000
Changeover home buyers average load $326,000 (figures for 2010-11 = most recent national figures).
Average amount of mortgage outstanding ($,000) 2009-10
Sydney 239
NSW bal of state $168
Melbourne $207
Vic rest of state $138
Brisbane $220
Qld rest of state $202
Adelaide $180
SA rest of state $124
Perth $232
WA rest of state $172
Hobart $140
Tas rest of state $126
Darwin $247
NT rest of state $195
Hmmm, double post.
Yep I'd agree with that. That is what I was thinking when I read your title, but then again I am in Adelaide.:
We bought the house (which had been on the market 7 months) in Feb 2012:
Should have stated, in capital cities/suburbs as rural is a different kettle of fish.
ABS - from 10/11 - first home owners average mortgage amount is under 300, from memory was around 270, and changeover buyers was around 350,000 (Australian census).
Average monthly mortgage repayments are $1950 in Vic. (2011 Census).
300k seems like it would be average but I know it's not....400k s scary :o
The largest ours has been it around 250k, it's under 200k now.
300k seems like it would be average but I know it's not....400k s scary :o
The largest ours has been it around 250k, it's under 200k now.
OK I'm delusional *doh*
I thought that the average might be about 500k
Round here 700k buys you a run down house with garden. For a nice house that doesn't need any improvements you'll cough up about 1m.
Where i live, (Western Sydney) the average price for a half decent home (3 bedrooms, garage/locked carport, 1 bathroom, backyard, single living room/dining room) is about $400,000-$450,000.
If you go closer towards Sydney, (about 30 odd minutes away from us) you're looking at about $600,000+ EASY. that's for a much older house, with a smaller block and just a generally smaller house.
Although i'd love to live closer to the city, i'm SO not willing to pay that much for a house!! :/