About SuburbCost
What a suburb really costs
SuburbCost calculates what a suburb costs to run each year: council rates, water, commute, insurance, and strata. Not the purchase price. The holding cost.
Last updated: July 2025 · Data source review: annually each JulyThe problem
Purchase price is one number. Running cost is another.
Property search tools tell you what a suburb costs to buy. None of them tell you what it costs to stay. Council rates, water bills, commute, building insurance — these add up to thousands every year, and they shift significantly between suburbs just a few kilometres apart.
In some Brisbane and Sydney suburbs, annual running costs exceed $15,000. In others they sit under $7,000. The suburb that looks cheap on purchase price is often the most expensive to run, and that gap is invisible in standard property research.
Choosing your commute mode compounds it further. Switching from driving to public transport can change which suburb wins by thousands of dollars a year. SuburbCost shows you both numbers side by side.
Methodology
What SuburbCost calculates
Five cost components make up each suburb's annual total. All figures are in Australian dollars, per year.
Council rates
Annual residential rates for the suburb's local government area. Brisbane City Council covers roughly 60% of Greater Brisbane suburbs.
Water rates
Annual residential water and sewerage charge. Queensland Urban Utilities publishes a typical annual residential bill used as the comparison figure.
Annual commute
Estimated annual commuting cost in your chosen mode. Toggle between public transport and driving to update all totals simultaneously.
Building insurance
Estimated annual premium. AI-estimated using suburb type, flood risk, fire risk, and cyclone exposure. Disclosed as estimate on every page.
Body corporate levy
Annual strata levy for unit properties. $0 for house properties. Estimated where no centralised public registry exists.
Commute calculation
How commute costs are calculated
The transport toggle lets you compare driving against public transport for any suburb. Each mode uses a different calculation.
Distance to the CBD × ATO rate
× 2 (return trip)
× return trips/year
× $0.88/km (ATO 2025–26)
= Annual driving cost
Driving cost is based on each suburb's distance to the CBD, across 48 working weeks. Commute frequency tapers with distance: 4 return trips per week near the CBD, easing to 2 per week by 60 km, since residents further out commute to the CBD less often. The ATO rate of 88 cents per kilometre covers fuel, depreciation, registration, and insurance for an average vehicle.
Translink flat fare × commute days
× 2 trips per day
× 192 commute days/year
= $192 per year
Queensland's Translink Go Card fare is a flat 50 cents per trip across all zones. The calculation uses 192 commute days (4 days/week × 48 working weeks).
A daily CBD commute from an outer suburb costs several times what an inner-city one does, even after the trip frequency tapers down. That gap is what makes the transport toggle matter.
| Distance to CBD | Return commute trips / week | Annual driving cost |
|---|---|---|
| 5 km (inner) | ~3.8 | ~$1,600 |
| 15 km (middle ring) | 3.5 | ~$4,400 |
| 30 km (outer) | 3 | ~$7,600 |
| 45 km (far outer) | 2.5 | ~$9,500 |
| 60 km+ | 2 (floor) | ~$10,100 |
| 100 km+ (regional) | flat allowance | $17,600 |
Data sources
Where the data comes from
Every data point links to a primary government or statutory source. No aggregators. Estimates are labelled on the page where they appear. The full list is on the data sources page.
Beyond cost
Risk profile and school ratings
Flood and fire risk ratings (Low, Medium, High) come from state spatial data, not guessed from postcode. In Queensland, flood risk draws on Queensland Globe flood extent layers, council hazard overlays and the February 2022 Brisbane flood dataset; fire risk uses QFES bushfire prone land mapping. In New South Wales, fire risk uses the RFS Bush Fire Prone Land layer, rated by how much of each suburb is high-hazard vegetation. NSW flood has no single statewide layer, so we model it from a 30 m elevation model and label it as modelled. Each suburb is classified from its own spatial footprint.
School scores (0 to 10) use ACARA's ICSEA Percentile divided by 10. A national average school scores around 7.0. Schools are matched to suburbs using coordinates from ACARA's School Location 2025 dataset against ABS suburb boundary files.
The team
Who built SuburbCost
SuburbCost is a Brisbane project built by someone who wanted to know the real cost of living, but didn't want to navigate multiple sites and annual budgets to find out. Council rates, water, commute, insurance. Costs that quietly add up to tens of thousands over a decade.
No investors. No sponsored rankings. No advertiser influence on the data. Revenue comes from disclosed referral arrangements with mortgage brokers, buyer's agents, and insurance comparison services. Every arrangement is declared in the footer.
SuburbCost is not a real estate agency, mortgage broker, buyer's agent, or financial adviser. It does not hold an Australian Credit Licence or Australian Financial Services Licence.
Questions or data corrections: contact@suburbcost.com.au
Coverage
Queensland and New South Wales. More states next.
SuburbCost covers more than 6,200 suburbs across two states. In Queensland that spans Brisbane City, Moreton Bay, Logan, Ipswich, Redland City, Sunshine Coast, Noosa, Gold Coast, Toowoomba, Cairns, Mackay and Townsville. In New South Wales it spans every Greater Sydney council, plus Newcastle, Lake Macquarie, Wollongong, the Central Coast, the Northern Rivers and regional NSW.
The calculation works the same across state lines. Council rates, water providers and public-transport fares differ between Queensland and New South Wales, so we source each state directly: QLD councils and Sydney Water, NSW councils and Opal fares. Melbourne, Perth and Adelaide come next.
If your suburb is not listed yet, email contact@suburbcost.com.au to request it.
Common questions
Frequently asked questions
Start here
See what your suburb really costs
Search any Queensland or NSW suburb. Get council rates, water, commute and insurance totalled up in seconds. Switch between driving and public transport to see how much the choice moves the number.
Compare suburbs →