Someone Paid $700,000 for This Palm Beach Home in 2015. It Just Sold for $2,120,000.

29 Third Avenue, Palm Beach, sold for $2,120,000 on 15 October 2026, eleven years after it last changed hands for $700,000 in May 2015.¹ Both prices come from public sales records. The sale was recorded after the Reserve Bank's September rate rise, in a season when Gold Coast homes were taking noticeably longer to sell, which makes it a useful piece of evidence: it shows what one Palm Beach seller achieved in this market, not the market of a year ago.

The market around it has changed since the autumn. Across 22 Gold Coast postcodes, homes that had been listed for 60 to 180 days without selling rose from 1,288 in March 2026 to 2,707 in September, the latest month published. A year earlier, in September 2025, the figure was 1,479.² The median Gold Coast house that sold in the three months to September had been on the market for 40 days, across 708 sales, up from 26.5 days for the three months to March.³ And on 29 September 2026 the Reserve Bank raised the cash rate to 4.60%; its next decision is due on 3 November.⁴ I set out what these indicators have historically been associated with in Unsold Gold Coast homes have doubled since March. This article looks at one sale inside that picture.

How the result compares with the suburb

The fairest yardstick is what Palm Beach house prices did over the same stretch. On the Fields rolling twelve-month median, the typical Palm Beach house sold for $620,000 in the twelve months to June 2015, across 226 house sales. In the twelve months to September 2026 it was $2,045,000, across 130 house sales.⁵ That is a rise of 229.8%.

Source: public sales records (29 Third Avenue); Fields market charts, Palm Beach houses, rolling twelve-month median sale price for the windows ending June 2015 and September 2026. The purchase sits inside the first window; the sale falls just after the second.

In 2015 this home cost about 13% more than the typical Palm Beach house. In 2026 it sold for about 4% more. Over eleven years it stayed above the middle of the Palm Beach market while the suburb's median rose a little faster. The median covers whichever houses sold in each twelve months, including homes built or rebuilt since 2015, so it is a guide rather than an exact like-for-like measure.

Against homes like it, the price sits higher. Across 51 three-bedroom house sales in Fields records for the twelve months to September 2026, the median was $1,850,000, and this sale landed $270,000 above it.⁶

What changed in between

When it sold in 2015, the listing described a cottage the owners of the day had restored and extended: polished brush box floors, an updated kitchen, a main bedroom with ensuite opening onto a north-facing deck, a second living area with a study nook, a rear shed set up as a home office, a 5 kW solar system, and side access for a car, boat or small caravan.⁷

The 2026 listing describes a contemporary single-level beach house: two living areas and the study nook, a contemporary kitchen with an island bench and gas cooking, an entertainer's deck with a built-in barbecue kitchen and bi-fold doors, a heated saltwater pool, a large rear shed with its own ensuite, two solar systems, a gated front courtyard and a double carport. It puts the beachfront about 400 metres from the front door.⁸

Read together, the two descriptions show work at the back of the block since 2015: the pool, the outdoor kitchen and an ensuite in the shed do not appear in the 2015 listing. So the 202.9% combines eleven years of Palm Beach price growth with improvements the records do not cost. What the records can show is that the house itself, on the same 506 m² block, sat above the suburb median at both ends of the eleven years.

What the records show about the home

Our property record holds a 506 m² block and about 244 m² of floor area, with three bedrooms and three bathrooms.⁹ In the twelve months to September 2026, Fields records hold 128 Palm Beach house sales with a recorded block size. Their median block was 607 m², and 24 of the 128 sat on less land. Among the 50 three-bedroom sales with a recorded block, the median was 560 m².⁶ So 506 m² is a compact Palm Beach block. In these numbered avenues it is a common size; 42 Second Avenue, 14 Morotai Avenue and 88 Third Avenue all sit on 506 m² too, and the house on it carries a pool, a deck, a shed and a front courtyard, a lot of use from an ordinary lot.

The sales around it

Source: Fields sales records and public sales records.¹⁰ All are three-bedroom houses within about 450 metres of 29 Third Avenue. Block sizes are cadastral lot areas; bedroom counts are from our property records.

The closest match is a block away. 42 Second Avenue, also three bedrooms on 506 m², sold for $2,100,000 in March, $20,000 less than 29 Third Avenue seven months later. Two other three-bedroom houses on similar blocks sold for $1,860,000 and $1,890,000 last November, and 14 Morotai Avenue sold for $2,685,000 in July. Read together, three-bedroom houses on blocks of about 500 m² in this pocket have recently sold between $1,860,000 and $2,685,000. We cannot see inside these homes or their contracts, so the table shows what each sold for, not why.

The campaign

Our listing record shows the home advertised at $2,195,000 from 3 August. It sold by private treaty for $2,120,000, which is $75,000 or 3.4% below that figure, 73 days after it was first advertised.¹ For context, across the twelve months to September 2026 the median Palm Beach house that sold had been advertised for 34.5 days, across 42 sales. Across the five southern-beaches suburbs we pool for selling times, the median house sold in the June quarter of 2026 had been advertised for 36 days, across 43 sales.¹¹ This campaign took about twice that, through August, September and into October, the months when Gold Coast selling times reached 40 days.

What this one sale can and cannot tell you

One sale does not set a market. What makes this one useful is its timing: it was recorded after the September rate rise, while the Gold Coast indicators above continued to describe longer selling times and more unsold stock.

What the sale does show is narrower and firmer. An improved three-bedroom Palm Beach house, 400 metres from the beach, sold in October 2026 a little above the suburb median, within the range of the three-bedroom sales around it, after a campaign about twice the suburb's usual length. Whether results like this continue as stock builds is something the next few months of recorded sales will show, and I will report them as they come in.

Fields Real Estate was not involved in either sale of this property.

1. Fields Real Estate sales records, 29 Third Avenue, Palm Beach. Compiled from public sale records: $700,000 (2 May 2015, private treaty, 37 days advertised) and $2,120,000 (15 October 2026, private treaty, 73 days advertised; advertised price on our listing record $2,195,000). ↩
2. SQM Research, total property listings by postcode. All dwelling types, homes listed 60 to 90 and 90 to 180 days combined, summed across 22 Gold Coast postcodes: 1,479 (September 2025), 1,288 (March 2026), 2,707 (September 2026); retrieved 29 October 2026. ↩
3. Fields Real Estate sold-property records, Gold Coast suburb panel. Median days from advertised date to sold date, houses, 64 Gold Coast suburbs, sales advertised three days or fewer excluded: 26.5 days for the three months to March 2026 (784 sales); 40 days for the three months to September 2026 (708 sales); recomputed 29 October 2026. ↩
4. Reserve Bank of Australia, Statement by the Monetary Policy Board: Monetary Policy Decision. 29 September 2026, cash rate target raised 25 basis points to 4.60%; next scheduled decision 3 November 2026. ↩
5. Palm Beach property market, Fields Real Estate. Houses, rolling twelve-month median sale price: $620,000 for July 2014 to June 2015 (226 sales); $2,045,000 for October 2025 to September 2026 (130 sales). ↩
6. Fields Real Estate sales records, Palm Beach houses. House sales October 2025 to September 2026: three-bedroom 51 sales, median $1,850,000; all houses with a recorded block 128 sales, median block 607 m²; three-bedroom with a recorded block 50 sales, median block 560 m². ↩
7. 29 Third Avenue, Palm Beach, 2015 sale campaign listing. Advertised listing description, paraphrased. ↩
8. 29 Third Avenue, Palm Beach, 2026 sale campaign listing. Advertised listing description, paraphrased. ↩
9. Fields Real Estate property record, 29 Third Avenue, Palm Beach. Cadastral lot area 506 m²; floor area about 244 m²; three bedrooms, three bathrooms. ↩
10. Fields Real Estate sales records, Palm Beach houses near Third Avenue. Compiled from public sale records; three-bedroom houses within about 450 metres sold November 2025 to July 2026. ↩
11. Palm Beach and southern beaches days on market, Fields Real Estate market charts. Median days advertised, final campaign, houses, sales advertised three days or fewer excluded: Palm Beach 34.5 days for the twelve months to September 2026 (42 sales); Palm Beach, Currumbin, Tugun, Bilinga and Coolangatta pooled, 36 days for the June quarter 2026 (43 sales). ↩