Methodology
Each live sale listing gets a weighted score from 0 to 100. The main input is an estimated gross rental yield: the asking price against an estimated weekly rent. Value against the suburb also counts. Suburb price and rent growth count only where we hold real figures for that suburb, and vacancy is not used, because the vacancy figures we hold are a placeholder rather than a measurement.
Scores are grouped into rank tiers so a listing can be read at a glance. Where a factor has no data behind it the listing is not scored as though the answer were bad; coverage is tracked separately so a thin listing cannot outrank a well-evidenced one by accident.
Suburb median asking prices are computed from the listings we track, split into houses and into units and townhouses, with the sample size and dates shown; houses include duplexes, terraces and semi-detached homes. Car spaces, storage units, shops, offices and other non-dwelling listings are left out. A figure is shown only when at least 10 listings support it; where neither type has enough, the median across all listings is shown instead, labelled as such. Suburb rents come from state rental bond data where we hold it. All of it is published free on the suburb and market data pages.