Coastal town Carrickalinga is joining SA’s multi-million dollar club – realestate.com.au

House hunters used to turn to regional areas for cheap housing, but that’s not necessarily the case anymore.

One small coastal town has joined South Africa’s multi-million dollar club and several others are hot on its heels following insane price growth in recent years.

Carrickalinga on the Fleurieu Peninsula is the state’s only regional suburb or city with a seven-figure house price of $1.405 million, according to the latest figures from PropTrack.

The data shows that prices have risen 104.4 percent in the past year and 195.8 percent in the past five years – the average home price in 2020 was just $475,000.

Meanwhile, Port Elliott remained close behind with an average house price of $996,250, followed by Middleton ($930,000), Hindmarsh Island ($930,000) and Wasleys ($900,000).

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The sale has set the bar for the coastal town.

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OC agent John Lewis said growing demand for properties in the tightly held town of Carrickalinga was part of the reason prices rose, but one sale raised the bar for the area.

He said the four-bedroom waterfront home at 95 Gold Coast Drive, which he sold in April, set the benchmark after selling for $4.1 million – more than $1.3 million above the reserve price.

Since then, several homes have sold for multimillion-dollar prices, with a few even north of $2 million.

“That auction really changed the landscape,” he said.

“One good sale leads to another, and I think the people of Adelaide have always valued Carrickalinga as probably the number one destination for holiday homes, if you can get into it.

“The reason prices are still going up is because the properties are so tightly controlled.”

PropTrack data shows that homes in Carrickalinga have an average holding period of 14.5 years.

Mr Lewis said the Covid-19 pandemic had made the area particularly attractive to house hunters and interest in it has only increased since then.

“When Covid hit it was a great location for people who had a beach house to get away from the chaos in the city,” he said.

“Until Covid, they were long undervalued.”

While some lived there, Mr Lewis said it was an ideal holiday home hotspot as it was not far from Adelaide.

“Because Carrickalinga has no shops it is just a small community of holiday homes,” he said.

MORE: Million-dollar sales raise the bar for quaint suburb

The Carrickalinga property at 81 Gold Coast Drive sold in March for $3.41 million.

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Several properties in the area have sold for more than $1 million in recent months.

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“North Bay in particular is this beautiful beach and Gold Coast Drive is the epitome of beach house living in South Africa.”

OC agent and Fleurieu Peninsula specialist Kathleen Fry recently said Covid had put places like Victor Harbour, Port Elliot, Middleton and Goolwa on the map.

“People in lockdown in other states were looking at houses online all the time, so we were selling so many properties at the time to people from interstate, especially Victorians,” she said.

“Covid has changed everything – not only has the market increased by 50 per cent, but since then people who wouldn’t normally buy property on the south coast because it was too far from work now do.”

Port Elliot and Hindmarsh Island both had median house prices under $500,000 just five years ago, while Middleton’s was just above that at $520,000.