Queensland's Rental Market Stuck in 'Gridlock' at 1 Per Cent Vacancy

Queensland's rental market showed no sign of loosening in late 2025. The Real Estate Institute of Queensland's September Quarter 2025 Residential Vacancy Rate Report, released in November, put the statewide vacancy rate at 1.0 per cent, unchanged and far below the 2.6 to 3.5 per cent range the institute regards as healthy.

Across the 50 local government areas and sub-regions covered, 38 recorded vacancy rates of 1.0 per cent or less. Over the quarter, 23 regions tightened, 15 were unchanged and 12 eased.

A traffic jam of renters

REIQ chief executive Antonia Mercorella likened the market to a traffic jam, with many people staying put because finding somewhere else to live was so difficult. She said the entrenched tightness had created a rental gridlock, in which tenants renewed leases not necessarily because they wanted to, but to avoid competing for a new home.

Residential Tenancies Authority data cited by the REIQ showed the median length of house tenancies rose to 21.1 months in 2024-25, from 20.8 months the year before, while unit tenancies held at about 18.2 months.

Region by region

The tightest markets were in regional Queensland. Cook, in Far North Queensland, recorded a vacancy rate of 0 per cent, with Charters Towers and Goondiwindi at 0.1 per cent. Most major centres also sat deep in tight territory:

• Greater Brisbane 0.9 per cent and Brisbane LGA 1.1 per cent.
• Ipswich and Logan 0.8 per cent; Gold Coast 1.0 per cent.
• Toowoomba 0.5 per cent, Cairns 0.7 per cent and Townsville 0.8 per cent.
• Sunshine Coast 1.0 per cent; Noosa 1.9 per cent.

Only a handful of areas offered relief. Gladstone eased to 2.2 per cent, and the Bay Islands, at 4.0 per cent, and the mining region of Isaac, at 5.5 per cent, were the only markets the REIQ classified as weak.

Applicants queue up

On the ground, property managers described intense competition. An inner-Brisbane agent told the ABC that every property advertised drew five or six applicants and sometimes up to 20, while a Coomera property manager on the northern Gold Coast said a standard four-bedroom home listed at $700 a week received more than 70 applications.

Mercorella said conditions were unlikely to improve in the final quarter of the year and called for faster new building, encouragement of investment in private rentals, and support for build-to-rent and smaller dwelling formats to break the gridlock.