Canterbury vs Earlwood

The median house price is $2.1M in Canterbury and $2.1M in Earlwood, so Canterbury is the cheaper entry point, with Earlwood houses about 1% dearer.

For units, Canterbury sits at a median of $755K against $965K in Earlwood, which makes Canterbury the more affordable unit market and Earlwood the pricier one.

On cash flow, Earlwood leads: houses there return a gross rental yield of 2.43%, compared with 2.17% in Canterbury, a gap of 0.26 percentage points.

Over the past year house prices moved +6.7% in Canterbury (an estimate) and -0.4% in Earlwood (an estimate), so recent momentum favours Canterbury, while Earlwood went backwards.

Rental vacancy is 1.1% in Earlwood and 1.7% in Canterbury, so landlords in Earlwood face less competition for tenants. Anything under 2% is generally read as a tight market where tenants compete for homes.

Earlwood is the bigger suburb, with a population of 18,053 against 9,430, larger than Canterbury; a larger suburb usually means a deeper pool of buyers and tenants.

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