Boat Harbour vs New Town

The median house price is $910K in Boat Harbour and $890K in New Town, so New Town is the cheaper entry point, with Boat Harbour houses about 2% dearer.

For units, Boat Harbour sits at a median of $510K against $480K in New Town, which makes New Town the more affordable unit market and Boat Harbour the pricier one.

On cash flow, New Town leads: houses there return a gross rental yield of 3.94%, compared with 1.98% in Boat Harbour, a gap of 1.96 percentage points.

Over the past year house prices moved +6.8% in Boat Harbour and +0.0% in New Town, so recent momentum favours Boat Harbour, although both suburbs recorded growth.

Looking back three years, Boat Harbour houses are +5.5% and New Town houses -6.4%, so Boat Harbour has compounded faster than New Town over the longer window.

Rental vacancy is 0.4% in New Town and 4.6% in Boat Harbour, so landlords in New Town face less competition for tenants. Anything under 2% is generally read as a tight market where tenants compete for homes.

New Town is the bigger suburb, with a population of 6,781 against 339, roughly 20 times the size of Boat Harbour; a larger suburb usually means a deeper pool of buyers and tenants.

In short: New Town for rental income, New Town for a lower purchase price, Boat Harbour for recent price momentum, New Town for the tighter rental market. Which matters more depends on whether the investor is buying for cash flow, capital growth or affordability.