Manly Real Estate

We decided that we liked Manly so much that we would stay here over Christmas, so as we settle into our new "home" for the next 10 days, I thought it would be fun to take a look at the real estate.

The housing market in Sydney and Perth, like Vancouver, has often made me laugh. "Really, you want how much for that?" Unlike Vancouver however, both cities appear to have legitimate reasons for being so expensive.

Though Manly is a surfer town, its proximity to Sydney (15 mins by fast ferry), the lovely harbours and Corso, plus the heritage homes and brand new builds, keep the property values high. There are also a lot of apartments here, but SFHs are more entertaining to look at.

The most recent median house price for Manly is $1.8 mil AUD. Property prices took a hit in 2004 and again in 2009, overall it looks as though things have been pretty peachy, with median prices at ~1.5 mil over the last decade. (Peachy if you've managed to cash in that is.)



For anyone even remotely familiar with the Sydney RE market, it won't come as a surprise that Manly doesn't even make it into the top 25 most expensive neighborhoods in Australia. The real estate here is truly dizzying.

Anyways, here's a little tour of the homes you can buy in Manly.

The "Starter" Home
$1.2 mil - Newish 2 BDRM,  1 bath, no view, tiny lot. Yawn. This is the cheapest SFH I could find in Manly, no joke.

The Tear Down
Single level home, bylaws allow two floors. Time to tear down and rebuild. Only $2.05 mil.

Full featured, if a bit small
Newish build, peakaboo views, a pool and an elevator. What more could you want for $4.23 mil.

If you have to ask...
...you can't afford it. 1930's heritage home, priced by negotiation.

While we're all having a good laugh at these prices, I thought I'd publish one more pic of the view from our temporary apartment. I guess I can see why people would want to live here.

-E