Highett (3190) sits approximately 16 kilometres south-east of Melbourne's CBD, straddling the Cities of Bayside and Kingston on the Frankston rail line. Its SEIFA IRSAD score of 1084 places it in decile 9 of 10 nationally and at the 88th percentile within Victoria, firmly in the advantaged band and well above the national mean of 1000. That reading reflects a suburb where household incomes, educational attainment, and occupational profiles sit materially above the Australian average. For investors, it is a useful starting point, not a conclusion.
ABS 2021 IRSAD release. Score 1084 (national mean = 1000).
A decile 9 SEIFA score carries real weight inside the PropertyRanker model. It feeds positively into three of the twelve scoring criteria: economic_strength, hazard_risk, and entry_point_risk. On economic_strength, the score signals a resident base with above-average capacity to sustain rents and absorb holding costs through softer cycles. On hazard_risk, higher-SEIFA areas tend to correlate with better-maintained infrastructure and lower exposure to socioeconomic stress events, though the score says nothing about physical hazards such as flood overlays or bushfire zones, which require separate overlay checks. On entry_point_risk, a decile 9 reading suggests the suburb is not a distressed or speculative market, but it also means the price floor is already elevated. As of the June quarter 2025, the median house price sat at approximately $1,555,000, with units at around $677,000. At those levels, gross yields on houses are likely to sit in the 3 to 3.5 percent range, which aligns most naturally with PropertyRanker's Capital Growth strategy anchor rather than the High Yield or Regional anchors. Investors targeting 5 percent or above should focus their analysis on the unit and apartment segment, where the yield arithmetic is more favourable, and should verify current asking rents against SQM vacancy data before assuming the numbers stack. Highett is also a suburb in active transition: former industrial and CSIRO land is being converted into higher-density residential product, which introduces both opportunity and supply-side risk depending on the specific site and timing of a given listing. SEIFA operates at the postcode level and cannot distinguish a well-located freestanding house from a new-build apartment in an oversupplied pocket of the same suburb.
Highett (VIC 3190) recorded a median house sale price of approximately $1,400,000, $1,500,000 as of mid-2026, with annual price growth ranging from +2.76% (CoreLogic via yourinvestmentpropertymag.com.au) to +5.2% (HtAG Analytics), reflecting a broadly positive but moderating market. There were 148, 215 house sales over the past 12 months depending on the source period, with average days on market of 36, 53 days for houses and a vendor discount of -5.0% per propertyvalue.com.au (Cotality/CoreLogic data). Supply remains tight with stock on market at just 0.24% and inventory at 1.78 months per HtAG Analytics, supporting continued upward price pressure.
Anchor points pulled per refresh from publicly available suburb profiles. Approximate; not a moving average.
Vacancy is tightening (1.24% rate, stock on market at 0.24% well below balanced-market threshold) and vendor discounts are stable at -5.0%, but days on market for houses have edged up ~7% year-on-year per Woodards, producing a net 'warming' read on two of three components.
Sources: Highett VIC 3190 Suburb Profile & Property Report (2026-08-11); Highett House Prices & Property Trends (2026-01-01); Highett VIC 3190 Property Market and House Prices 2026 (2026-08-01); Highett Property Market and Trends (2026-07-22); Highett VIC Property Market & House Prices (2026-01-31) · Refreshed 23 Aug 2026
PropertyRanker scores any Australian property against 12 criteria across three pillars: Growth, Cashflow, and Risk. SEIFA is a primary signal for economic strength and a supporting one for entry-price risk. It also informs the crime side of hazard risk, though physical overlays like flood, bushfire and coastal exposure, and recorded crime data where available, take priority there. The decile of 9 shown above gives a listing in Highett a stronger starting line on economic strength than the national median postcode, and a softer one on entry-price risk, since more advantaged postcodes usually carry higher entry prices.
On top of that, PropertyRanker chooses one of four strategies (Balanced, Growth, Yield, Regional) and applies a per-strategy yield anchor. The anchors are 3.5% for Growth, 5% for Balanced, 6% for Yield, and 7% for Regional. A postcode at this level of relative advantage tends to suit the Growth (3.5% anchor) and Balanced (5% anchor) strategies more readily than Yield (6%) or Regional (7%), because a higher entry price compresses the gross yield a listing can reach without a specific value-add.
Read the scoring guide for the full criteria list and how the verdict thresholds work.
SEIFA is a postcode-level read. The fastest sanity check on any single decile reading is to compare it against the suburbs that surround it.
A strong SEIFA reading does not make any individual listing a buy. Before acting on this postcode-level signal, investors should check the following. First, confirm current SQM vacancy rates for 3190; a tightening vacancy supports the yield case while a rising rate in the unit segment warrants caution given active new supply from the Highett Common and related developments. Second, if the listing is a strata title, obtain the owners corporation records and check the capital works fund balance and any pending special levies. Third, pull the planning and overlay certificate for the specific lot to identify flood, heritage, or development overlay constraints that SEIFA cannot see. Fourth, compare the asking price against recent comparable sales in the same street type and dwelling category, not just the suburb median. Finally, run the specific listing through PropertyRanker to receive a verdict that accounts for all twelve scoring criteria, including the factors a postcode-level SEIFA reading cannot reach.
A decile 9 SEIFA reading signals a resident base with above-average income, educational attainment, and occupational profiles, which feeds positively into PropertyRanker's economic_strength and hazard_risk criteria. What it does not signal is value or yield; the elevated price floor that comes with an advantaged suburb compresses gross returns, particularly on houses. The data suggests Highett is a structurally sound suburb, but investors still need to score a specific listing to understand whether the numbers work for their strategy.
The Capital Growth strategy, anchored around a 3.5 percent gross yield, aligns most naturally with the house segment, where the price floor is already elevated. Investors targeting the Balanced strategy (around 5 percent) should focus their analysis on the unit and apartment segment, where the yield arithmetic is more favourable. The High Yield and Regional anchors (6 to 7 percent) are unlikely to be supported by current market conditions in this postcode; score the specific listing on PropertyRanker to check whether any individual property clears those thresholds.
The most suburb-specific risk is supply-side pressure from the former CSIRO site on Graham Road, now being developed as Highett Common, a masterplanned precinct approved for over 1,000 dwellings across multiple stages, with Stage 1 already completed as of late 2025. That level of new stock in a concentrated pocket of the suburb can weigh on resale values and asking rents for nearby apartments if absorption is slower than projected. A second infrastructure consideration is that Highett station is scheduled for elevation and full reconstruction under the Level Crossing Removal Project, with completion targeted for 2029; construction disruption in the interim is worth factoring into holding-cost assumptions. The SEIFA score does not capture physical hazards, so flood overlay and planning overlay checks remain the investor's responsibility.
SEIFA operates at the postcode level and feeds into three of PropertyRanker's twelve scoring criteria for any listing in 3190: economic_strength, where the decile 9 reading indicates a tenant and owner-occupier base with above-average capacity to sustain rents; hazard_risk, where higher-SEIFA suburbs tend to correlate with better-maintained infrastructure, though physical overlays such as flood zones must still be verified separately; and entry_point_risk, where an advantaged band score confirms this is not a distressed market, but also means the price floor is already high. Because SEIFA cannot distinguish a well-located freestanding house from a new-build apartment in an oversupplied pocket, the remaining nine criteria in the model are what differentiate individual listings within the same postcode.
The Victorian Government's Level Crossing Removal Project is scheduled to remove two level crossings at Highett Road and Wickham Road and deliver a new elevated Highett station by 2029. Proximity to an upgraded station can be a positive long-run signal for liveability and tenant demand, but the construction timeline also means a period of disruption to the Frankston line and local road access before completion. Investors should note which side of the rail corridor a specific property sits on and verify the current construction staging, as the impact varies materially by exact location within the suburb.
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