Melbourne west ยท VIC 3018

Buyers agent in Altona

A beach suburb twelve kilometres from the city that has done nothing for five years.

Figures below are August 2026, suburb level, all bedroom counts. Full Hobsons Bay council report.

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The Altona numbers

Houses

$1,110,421

Typical price

$668

Weekly rent

3.13%

Gross yield

+3.0%

Growth a year, 10yr

+0.2%

Growth, last 12mth

169

Sales a year

Units

$722,805

Typical price

$538

Weekly rent

3.87%

Gross yield

+2.0%

Growth a year, 10yr

+0.1%

Growth, last 12mth

153

Sales a year

Vacancy rate 2.18% across roughly 7,090 dwellings. HtAG Analytics, suburb level, all bedroom counts. Typical price is a modelled estimate, not a median of recent sales.

The honest read

What I'd tell you over a coffee

Altona houses have grown 2.99% a year over ten years to $1,110,421. Then look at the recent windows. Five years at 0.27% a year, three years at 0.45%, the last twelve months at 0.16%.

That is a market that stopped. Not crashed, stopped.

Rent has gone the other way, up 5.24% a year over the decade, one of the stronger rent numbers on this list. The yield is 3.13%, which is reasonable for a bayside suburb.

Vacancy is 2.18% though, which is soft for a place with a beach and a train line. There is more rental stock here than the postcode suggests.

169 house sales a year across about 7,090 dwellings. Units at $722,805 have done 2.02% a year, so the same story one rung down.

It is a genuinely nice spot. The data just says the price stopped moving around 2021.

Who Altona suits

People who want a beach and a train line at half of what bayside proper costs, and are buying somewhere to live. As an investment the rent has been doing better than the price for five years.

What I'd watch

The flat line. Five years at 0.27% a year is long enough that it needs an explanation, and "it is due" is not one. If your case for Altona depends on it catching up to Williamstown, ask what specifically would cause that.

How I work

  • Flat $20,000 fee, whatever you buy and wherever it is
  • No commissions from agents, developers or builders
  • I'll tell you when a suburb doesn't stack up, including this one
How the process runs

Fair questions

Buying in Altona, answered

Why has Altona flatlined?

The honest answer is I do not know for certain, and anyone who tells you they do is guessing. What the data shows is a decade of 2.99% a year that stopped about five years ago while rent kept climbing at over 5%. That gap usually means people want to live somewhere more than they want to own it at current prices.

Is the rent any good?

Better than the price. 5.24% a year growth over the decade on a 3.13% yield. Vacancy at 2.18% is the soft spot, so the property needs to be the good one.

Altona or Williamstown?

Different money and different markets. What I would say is that Altona's ten year growth of 2.99% is respectable and its last five years are not, so get the current numbers on both before you assume the cheaper one is the better buy.

Other Melbourne suburbs

Same treatment, same data, different answer in every one of them.

Thinking seriously about Altona? Read the full Hobsons Bay council report before you look at a single listing.

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