Upper North Shore house prices, spring 2026: what winter’s sellers actually got

Sarah Kaye & Co Research

The headlines say Sydney is in a reckoning. We followed the same Upper North Shore homes through two sales to see what sellers really got this winter, which suburbs fell most, and what that means for spring.

If you own a home on the Upper North Shore, September’s newspapers will not have made comfortable reading. Sydney values are seven per cent off their February peak. Auctioneers count two bidders where there used to be seven. One agent called it the day everything hit at once. Some of that is true here. Some of it is not. This report sorts one from the other, suburb by suburb, using the one source nobody can massage.

That source is the register: the NSW Valuer General’s record of every settled sale in the state. It runs a few weeks behind the market, because a sale only appears once it has settled and been lodged. But it is the truth of what changed hands and for how much. In our September column in the Sydney Observer we used it to show this district was running two markets at once. This time we do something new with it. We followed the same homes through two sales.

What winter’s sellers actually got

Here is the test. Take every home in our ten suburbs, Roseville to Hornsby, that sold this winter. Keep only the ones that had also sold between eighteen months and five years earlier. That lets us compare two prices for the same home. Then drop anything that was not an ordinary sale between strangers. Drop anything resold inside eighteen months, which is usually a renovation flip. Drop anything with a gain so large it must have been rebuilt. What is left is about 2,500 clean pairs since 2015. It is the cleanest price test the register can give.

Last winter, the typical seller made 10 per cent on what they had paid. The winter before, 8 per cent. This winter, 2.5 per cent. One in three sold for less than they paid. For houses, the typical gain fell from 16 per cent to 2.5 per cent. Roughly a third of house sellers took a loss. In each of the two winters before, it was about one in sixteen. Units made little in any of the three winters, between 2 and 6 per cent, and about three in ten sold at a loss each time.

The turn was quick, and the register dates it. In the March quarter, sellers were still making eight per cent, close to what they had made for three years. In the June quarter the typical gain fell to 2.5 per cent. The share selling at a loss rose to 37 per cent. July and August so far look a little better, but on too few sales to call. Whatever the papers said in September, the change on the Upper North Shore happened between April and June. That is after the first two rate rises and the May Budget.

Winter also traded thin. Comparing identical windows, the ten suburbs settled 248 sales this winter. The two winters before gave 299 and 308. That is an 18 per cent shortfall. Fewer homes sold, and the ones that did sold for little gain. That is the record spring starts from.

Who can afford to sell this spring

The same test tells you something the listings portals cannot: who is in a position to sell. Owners who bought in 2021, 2022 or 2023 and sold this year still came out seven to nine per cent ahead. Owners in the same position can move if they want to. They are the upsizers we are meeting at open homes across the Upper North Shore. Owners who bought in 2024 and sold this year barely broke even, and nearly half took a loss. Most people in that position will stay put unless a job, a baby or a separation forces the issue.

So expect a spring with fewer homes for sale than the calendar suggests. Most will be sold by people who have owned for a while. That is not a forecast from a model. It is what the register says about the people who would have to do the selling.

The squeeze is in the middle

Now split the sellers by what they paid. Under $2.5 million, the typical gain barely changed: eight per cent last year, 6.6 per cent this year. About one in four sold at a loss both times. Over $4 million, the gain eased from 15 per cent to 11.5, though few owners at that level are selling at all. In between, from $2.5 million to $4 million, the gain fell from 14 per cent to 3.5. The share selling at a loss went from one in eleven to more than one in three. Sales in that band were also down 31 per cent on a normal winter, the biggest fall of any band.

Cotality’s suburb figures point the same way. Cotality, which many readers will know as RP Data, publishes a monthly estimate of the median home value in each suburb. It is a model, not a sale, so we use it to add detail to the register rather than to replace it. On its reading the three dearest suburbs, Roseville, Lindfield and Killara, lost the least over the year to August: five to eight per cent. The next band down lost the most. Gordon is off 19 per cent, Pymble and St Ives 12, Wahroonga 11, Turramurra 9. Hornsby, the cheapest, sits at 7. Gordon’s figure rests on about sixty house sales a year, so treat it as the direction rather than the number.

Time on market tells the same story. Houses across the Ku-ring-gai council area took 32 days to sell for most of last year. From February that figure rose every month, to 40 by June. Units did not slow. The reason is simple. People can only pay what they can borrow, and three rate rises this year hit the family with the big mortgage first. The top end has mostly stopped selling. The entry end kept trading at flat prices. And for perspective, every suburb here is still 32 to 41 per cent above where it stood in August 2020.

House and unit prices by Upper North Shore suburb

The table below sets out three things for each Upper North Shore suburb. The median sale price for houses and units over the year to September. Cotality’s estimate of the median home value at August 2026, with its twelve-month change. And days on market. The two price columns differ on purpose. The median sale price is the middle of what actually sold. It rises and falls with the mix of homes that happened to trade. The Cotality value estimates what all homes in the suburb are worth. It moves with prices rather than with the mix. Days on market is a rolling twelve-month median to June.

House and unit prices by Upper North Shore suburb, spring 2026

Median sale prices are Cotality’s trailing twelve-month medians at 24 September 2026. Values are Cotality’s monthly median value estimates at August 2026, with the change on August 2025. Days on market is Cotality’s rolling twelve-month median to June 2026. Gordon’s house value reading is the thinnest in the set. North Turramurra is included in the register analysis but has no separate Cotality report.

Two things stand out. First, the two dearest suburbs on the register, Roseville and Lindfield, have the smallest value falls in the district. Second, Wahroonga is where the market is clearing. Its houses sell fastest of all, in 28 days, but at values 11 per cent below a year ago. It is also the only suburb where unit values rose.

What we see at the door

As Upper North Shore buyers agents we spend most Saturdays at open homes, so here is a field note, and it is only that. Until a fortnight ago we were often the only people at an inspection. In the last two weeks buyers have come back. Not many, but noticeably, and it coincided with talk of a fourth rate rise. The $3 million to $5 million band has the most choice, if not always the best homes. It is also where the register shows the fewest sales going through. Just 23 settled this winter, against 37 and 52 in the two winters before. Above $5 million there is little on the market and owners are waiting. What does come up at the very top is selling: thirteen sales above $10 million so far this year, against four by this time last year.

What the newspapers say, and what holds here

We read the same papers you do, and the Financial Review’s property coverage this month has been better than most. Four of its themes deserve a local check. First, that Sydney is down seven per cent from its peak. On the Upper North Shore the register and Cotality both say the fall is at least that. Almost all of it came after February. Second, that the top end is falling fastest, by 15 to 20 per cent in some accounts: not here. Our dearest suburbs fell least, and the pain sits in the family band below them. Third, that the affordable end is holding: true here, on both price and turnover. Fourth, that spring has opened thin, with sellers pulling auctions and buyers waiting on the Reserve Bank. That matches what we see. It also matches a register that shows fewer people able to sell.

Spring so far, and spring’s test

The register cannot see spring yet. Homes that sold in the first half of September and had settled by the latest weekly update number just one or two. That was true in each of the past three years. The first proper reading arrives with the late October updates. The live signs say the season opened thin but not dead. Sydney’s clearance rate reached almost 60 per cent in mid-September, then eased as more homes went to auction. In that September column we set an exam question: does the school-year clock bring family buyers back to the top end before Christmas? Too early to say. The tell is five-bedroom clearance through October, and we will report it either way.

So here is spring’s test, on the record before the season can influence it. Winter’s sellers made 2.5 per cent and a third took a loss. If spring’s sellers do better than that, on the same test with the same exclusions, the season worked. The first reading comes in November.

If you are hoping to upsize

The window is still open. Your apartment or three-bedroom house held its value through winter. The larger home you want did not, and the register shows fewer rivals bidding for it. But a fourth rate rise is widely expected, and each one shrinks the loan that bridges the gap. The window is open, and the price of the ticket is rising. Do the borrowing sums first, then the house hunt.

If you are weighing a downsize

The trade still runs against you. You would be selling the slow, softened asset and buying into the firm, fast one. It can still be the right move for reasons no spreadsheet captures. The register says most sellers here are choosing realism rather than being forced into it. That is the right order. Price from day one for the market you are in, and have the purchase ready to go.

If you are buying your first home, or a unit

Do not expect spring to hand you a discount. The falling-market headlines are about a band you are probably not buying in. Unit prices held flat through winter. Hornsby units still sell in under three weeks. The entry end traded on while everything above it stalled. Where you do have an edge is on any home that has sat for two months. Time is on your side there. Use it for due diligence, not just for negotiation.

Where this leaves us

Two markets, still, but the line between them has moved. In September’s column we put it at $4 million. The fuller record puts it nearer $2.5 million. The squeeze sits in the family band above that line, and the top end is quiet rather than cheap. Winter is in the book. Spring is on the clock, with a rate decision attached. If you are weighing a move on the Upper North Shore this season, we are happy to talk it through against the numbers rather than the headlines. How we work across the whole North Shore is on our North Shore service page. The Lower North Shore and Northern Beaches editions of this report sit alongside this one, and the three-district overview pulls the three together.

Methodology and sources

Settled sales and resales: Sarah Kaye & Co Research analysis of NSW Valuer General Property Sales Information (Land Registry Services); ten core Upper North Shore suburbs (Roseville, Lindfield, Killara, Gordon, Pymble, Turramurra, North Turramurra, St Ives, Wahroonga, Hornsby), as at the 21 September 2026 weekly release. Arm’s-length sales only (no low-value, bulk or non-standard transfers), $400,000 and above. Resale pairs match the same property across two consecutive sales (houses by the register’s property identifier; units by that identifier and the unit’s address, because every unit in a strata building shares one identifier); holds under 18 months (possible flips), gains above 60 per cent (likely rebuilds) and non-round prices on either sale (possible related-party transfers) are excluded, leaving 2,523 pairs since 2015. Winter figures are contracts dated 1 June to 31 August of each year; the 2026 winter reading rests on 46 pairs (19 houses, 27 units) and the June quarter on 54, so both are treated as directional. Winter sales counts are lag-matched: contracts 1 June to 31 August settled by 3 September of the same year, 2026 against 2024 and 2025. Sales above $10 million are contracts dated January to August of each year. Suburb values, median sale prices and days on market: Cotality (RP Data) suburb statistics reports for Roseville, Lindfield, Killara, Gordon, Pymble, Warrawee, Turramurra, Wahroonga, St Ives and Hornsby, prepared 24 September 2026; median values are Cotality’s monthly model estimates to August 2026 and are used as corroboration, not as the price source of record. Days on market for the Ku-ring-gai council area is Cotality’s rolling twelve-month median to June 2026. Sydney-wide figures, clearance rates and agent commentary: Cotality and Australian Financial Review reporting, 8 to 24 September 2026. Field observations are the firm’s own and are not statistics. The register will not show spring contracts in volume until late October.