The term ‘tree-change’ was bandied about a lot in 2020 – and with good reason.
Not to bring up bad memories from that year, but many Australians fled capital cities in favour of the less crowded, less locked-down regions.
In the September 2020 quarter, there was a record net loss of 11,200 people from capital cities to regional areas, according to Australian Bureau of Statistics data.
That record was surpassed in the March 2021 quarter, when 11,800 people made a move from the city to the country.
But people are coming back to the cities now, right? Well, no actually.
Quarterly internal migration data from the ABS released in March, shows a net of 7901 people moved from capital cities to the regions in the three months to September last year.
It’s not at the record highs seen during lockdowns – but still shows the growth of Australia's regional areas.
And that growth is not just in population, but in home prices, too.
Each year, REA Group compiles its Hot 100 list to pinpoint suburbs tipped to see short- to medium-term growth based on factors including location, family appeal, affordability – and – population growth.
If we look at the nine regional ‘tree-change’ suburbs identified for their strong growth prospects in the REA Group 2025 Hot 100 list, eight of them saw annual house-price growth and all saw growth for house prices (and where relevant, unit prices) in the past five and 10 years.
The greater statistical area each suburb sits within also saw population growth of up to about 1650 people in the year between 2023 and 2024 (the most recent ABS estimates on record).
The Hot 100 tree-change suburb which saw the highest year-on-year growth in house prices was Murray Bridge in South Australia – its median increased by 22.5% to $490,000 in the year to February, PropTrack data shows.
It also saw the most rapid growth in the past five years – a whopping 120.7% price increase.
But when looking at 10-year growth, it was on par with some of the suburbs which have recently seen slow growth or even declines.
Take Orange in New South Wales for example. Its median house price saw an annual decline of 1.1% in February, however, its 10-year price growth was close to that of Murray Bridge at 7.3%.
It’s a similar story for most suburbs – regional or not – as most states have recorded massive price gains in the years since the pandemic thanks to a surge in demand and supply issues.
The 10-year data gives us a better idea of what is the general norm for property-price growth.
Of the entire Hot 100 list, no suburbs recorded declines in house prices during the 10-years to February, despite some of them seeing year-on-year declines after very strong five-year growth.
More than half had seen house prices increase by more than 6.8% in the decade.
Of the tree-change suburbs, Nambour in Queensland had the strongest price growth for both houses and units in 10 years – increasing by 8.6% to $769,000 and 9.7% to $540,000, respectively.
In fact, regional Queensland recorded the most tree-change suburbs on the list and also saw the largest population increase based on internal migration by a long shot – a net gain of 3328 people.
This is compared with 2091 in regional NSW, 1846 in Victoria, 457 in SA and 306 in WA.
In this way, we can see how population growth – and particularly internal migration or ‘tree changing’ –can have an impact upon property prices and the overall desirability of a suburb.
