Calderwood vs Sunshine

Houses cost about the same in both suburbs: the median house price is $1.1M in Calderwood and $1.1M in Sunshine.

For units, Calderwood sits at a median of $720K against $590K in Sunshine, which makes Sunshine the more affordable unit market and Calderwood the pricier one.

On cash flow, Calderwood leads: houses there return a gross rental yield of 4.00%, compared with 3.86% in Sunshine, a gap of 0.14 percentage points.

Over the past year house prices moved +16.5% in Calderwood and +11.3% in Sunshine, so recent momentum favours Calderwood, although both suburbs recorded growth.

Looking back three years, Calderwood houses are +22.6% and Sunshine houses +13.9%, so Calderwood has compounded faster than Sunshine over the longer window.

Rental vacancy is 0.1% in Calderwood and 6.3% in Sunshine, so landlords in Calderwood face less competition for tenants. Anything under 2% is generally read as a tight market where tenants compete for homes.

Calderwood is the bigger suburb, with a population of 3,013 against 475, roughly 6 times the size of Sunshine; a larger suburb usually means a deeper pool of buyers and tenants.

In short: Calderwood for rental income, Calderwood for recent price momentum, Calderwood for the tighter rental market. Which matters more depends on whether the investor is buying for cash flow, capital growth or affordability.