The Melbourne municipalities of Greater Dandenong, Hume and Yarra are among the hotspot municipalities for buyer demand.
Melbourne and regional Victoria have been tipped for a two-year supercharged real estate recovery expected to deliver double-digit price growth to owners’ hip pockets.
After years of flatlining, Victorian communities now dominate the list of areas around the country anticipated for a 2026 and 2027 boom, according to research by real estate analysts Hotspotting.
The municipalities of Ballarat, Greater Dandenong, Geelong, Hume, Mitchell and Yarra all made the firm’s list of top 10 Australian council areas for escalating buyer demand, a precursor to price growth.
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The report, based on home sales data from PropTrack, states that regional Victoria boasts one of the most upwardly mobile markets in the nation.
It’s on the cusp of returning to the Covid pandemic’s “heady days” when sales boomed in 2021 after recording 13,299 home sales between October and December 2025, a 32 per cent increase compared to 12 months prior.
And the Greater Melbourne market “is one of the most compelling recovery stories in the national dataset” with 34,209 sales in the same time frame, close to its 34,878 sales figure of December 2021.
This four-bedroom house at 8 Ram Circuit, Wallan, is for sale with a $620,000-$680,000 range. The suburb, which has a $615,000 median house price, is among those highlighted for “supercharged” buyer demand in the Hotspotting report.
Hotspotting director Terry Ryder said Victoria’s capital and its regions would likely see improved prices in the next 12 months to two years, based on positive trends in surging sales numbers, even when accounting for interest rate increases and skyrocketing petrol costs.
“Melbourne and regional Victoria have been quite dormant, but the analysis of the sales activity figure suggests that in 2026 we’re going to see prices rising at higher rates than we have in the last few years in most Victorian markets,” he said.
Mr Ryder said he was expecting Melbourne and regional Victoria to deliver double-digit median house value rises.
He added that buyers seeking affordability were driving demand in some Victorian hotspots, including for units in the Yarra suburbs of Collingwood, Fitzroy and Richmond and houses in Hume’s Sunbury, Craigieburn, Greenvale and Broadmeadows, as outlined in the Hotspotting Autumn Price Predictor Index report.
According to the report, Melbourne is well-positioned to set new volume record sales in the first half of 2026. Picture: Sarah Matray.
Cohen Handler Buyers Agents’ business director Zac Jacobs said soaring fuel costs and interest rate rises had caused some market disruption in the past fortnight.
However, Melbourne is “absolutely a buyer’s market” at the moment thanks to less competition at auctions and more off-market listings.
“We’ve seen in the last couple of weeks, prices of about 80 per cent of properties are selling in, or at, the lower range of expectations and that’s unusual in a market like this,” Mr Jacobs said.
At 13 Windsor Rise, Sunbury, this house is for sale with $750,000-$795,000 price hopes. The area, with a $710,000 median house price, is another spotlighted as a supercharged suburb in the Hotspotting research.
He said buyers seeking good capital growth should avoid CBD apartments and outer suburban house and land packages, due to an over-saturation of these types of listings.
It’s also smart to check what’s slated in suburbs the state government has earmarked for future large apartment developments, in a moves to tackle the housing crisis.
“Even Brighton, with potentially 12-storey apartment blocks going up, these things will affect your price growth,” Mr Jacobs said.
“Because people are moving there for the lifestyle but if they’re going to be surrounded by apartment blocks and traffic jams, they won’t want to be there anymore.”
Other Melbourne municipalities highlighted in the Hotspotting report as future standouts include Moonee Valley (pictured), Monash, Knox, Maribyrnong and Whittlesea. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Ian Currie.
Di Battista Real Estate Craigieburn director Daniel Di Battista said there was some uncertainty in the market and sales were taking a bit longer to finalise.
But with plenty of transactions still happening, he reckons median prices are likely to rise.
“The couples who are selling and then saying, ‘We’ll wait out it and see what happens,’ I think they’re playing with fire – I think they might get priced out in the next year or so,” Mr Di Battista said.
This circa-1890s cottage at 802A Sebastopol St, Ballarat Central, has a $649,000-$713,000 asking range. The town is among the regional Victorian areas with rising buyer demand, and has a $660,750 typical house price.
He’s seeing many buyers selling and then purchasing a new home within the same suburb or a neighbouring area of Hume.
“We’re also noticing some people from the other side of town downsizing their mortgage, buying a similar house but on this side of Melbourne and then having about half their previous mortgage size,” Mr Di Battista said.
Terry Ryder said value for money was now overtaking concerns about the Victorian government’s recently-increased land taxes and rental reforms, for many buyers.
MELBOURNE AREAS SUPERCHARGED FOR FUTURE PRICE GROWTH
| Suburb/property type | Median price |
| Dandenong units | $445,000 |
| Noble Park houses | $831,000 |
| Broadmeadows houses | $640,000 |
| Craigieburn houses | $705,000 |
| Greenvale houses | $885,000 |
| Sunbury houses | $710,000 |
| Beveridge houses | $650,000 |
| Broadford houses | $610,000 |
| Kilmore houses | $622,500 |
| Wallan houses | $615,000 |
| Collingwood units | $615,000 |
| Fitzroy units | $773,000 |
| Richmond units | $569,000 |
| Clifton Hill houses | $1,592,500 |
Source: Hotspotting’s National Research Report: The Price Predictor Index Autumn 2026 and PropTrack. Median prices are from March 2025 to February 2026.
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