First published 7 Nov 2026, 12:30am
Adelaide’s prestige market has proven to be withstanding the toll of recent interest rate rises, with the number of prestige suburbs remaining largely unchanged since rates started rising, despite other suburbs reporting median value losses across the state.
Analysis of realestate.com.au data shows while many suburbs and towns across the state have reported median value losses since the Reserve Bank of Australia started raising interest rates in February, the number of suburbs with a $2m median has held fairly consistent over the past nine months.
Back in February, when interest rates lifted for the first time in four months, there were 16 suburbs with a $2m median.
Prices are holding strong in Adelaide’s blue-chip suburbs. Picture: Brenton Edwards
In March and May when they rose both times there were 18 and 20 (with 19 in April when the RBA didn’t meet), and in the next two three months when rates held – June, July and August – there were 22, 21 and 20.
Rates rose again over the past two months, while the number of $2m suburbs sat at 22 and 20.
Williams Real Estate principal Stephanie Williams said prestige Adelaide property’s rarity relative to the demand for it was not only keeping prices up, but also driving them higher.
“Unley Park, for instance, is performing extremely well – we’ve just sold one in there in three days so it demonstrates the prestige market is performing extremely well.
Williams Real Estate’s Stephanie Williams says Adelaide’s prestige market is firing on all cylinders. Picture: Roy VanDerVegt
“This market – those buyers are traditionally immune to interest rates.
“Rates don’t seem to matter at this bracket because if you’ve got a prestige property that comes to the market – some of these are very rare properties, and the exclusivity of them in how rarely they come up, particularly in Tennyson which is one of the strongest markets in the state right now, means they will always command a premium price and that keeps the top-end market extremely buoyant.
“Some of these properties, people have been waiting for years to come up, and whether interest rates are high or low, they’re going to buy them regardless.”
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Mrs Williams said unprecedented economic times often drove people to the prestige market.
“In uncertain times it makes them engage with property and they start to think: ‘I’ll invest in my principal place of residence because I’m spending a lot more time here and I don’t want to travel because of all of the global uncertainties’, and they’re happy to pay for it,” she said.
She said she expected prestige properties to rise in the next year as supply tightens further.
Real Estate Institute of South Australia chief executive Andrea Heading said the areas that seemed to be weathering the current market correction better than others were the all tightly-held and sought-after with a particular type of property – and mainly on larger blocks.
She said the top end of the market was holding up better than the lower end through the downturn.
“What we’re expecting is for the market to balance out a little but it’s harder when there are those unique price points,” she said.
Ms Heading said househunters could expect to see more prestige properties hit the market in sought-after areas as it moved into peak selling season.
“In the last three days … there are some really beautiful properties that have been listed,” she said.
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