Townsville luring in regional movers

The number of people ditching other regional centres to call Townsville home has skyrocketed, according to the latest Regional Movers Index.

The report, by Commonwealth Bank and the Regional Australia Institute, found net regional migration to Townsville spiked 593 per cent between 2021 and 2022.

The North Queensland city was also the sixth most popular destinations for regional-to-regional movers.

Regional Australia Institute CEO, Liz Ritchie said the impact of capital city movers to the regions during Covid was having a flow on effect to other regional places.

“In the early days of Covid, the high growth places were generally high amenity locations such as the Surf Coast, Byron Bay and Noosa,” she said.

“The latest dataset shows us that regional people are leaving these areas for other inland centres or coastal towns – with a growing number opting to go even further away from Sydney and Melbourne.”

Ray White Townsville principal Giovanni Spinella said he was “absolutely” seeing an increase in people moving to Townsville from outside the capital cities.

“We’re getting a good influx of migration from inland mining towns, such as Mt Isa and Cloncurry, and even places closer by such as Ingham and Ayr,” he said.

“We surprisingly find families coming from as far south as Bundaberg.”

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Mr Spinella said out-of-towners were finding Townsville offered a great year round lifestyle coupled with job opportunities and affordable real estate.

“They’re realising Townsville has everything they need … and a good mix of that work/life balance,” he said.

“We’ve got services, support, work, lifestyle and an amazing climate as well as good schools, good restaurants and good shopping.

“The airport is being upgraded and we’re getting more flights in and out.

“And convenience is a big thing. People are so blown away that the commute around Townsville is so easy.”

Mr Spinella said population growth had been strong for the past two years with evident impact on the Townsville property market.

“It’s keeping days on market low and stock on market low,” he said.

“We haven’t really seen any changes in our statistics over the past 12 months and prices are firm.”

The local property expert said he expected the Townsville population would continue to grow.

“With shortages in the rental market and low sales stock, there will continue to be a need for housing in Townsville,” he said.