Located in New South Wales, Booragul sits 142 km from Sydney CBD, around 1 hour 50 minutes by car. The suburb has 1,623 residents, a median age of 51, and a median household income of $57,928 per year. By household income, education, and employment patterns, it ranks in the bottom 20% nationally. The suburb grew 26.7% between 2016 and 2021. At the 2021 Census, households here paid a median rent of $320 per week and a median monthly mortgage of $1,636. Booragul is characterised by high crime risk and no recorded bushfire exposure. Of 5 schools within the suburb boundary, 1 ranks above the state average, and walkability is moderate.
Is Booragul a good suburb?
Booragul scores a C (41/100) on SuburbScan's Liveability grade — strong on transit, weaker on safety and community.
Mixed results
5 schools · 1 above peer schools
Very walkable
Walkability 61/100 · 141.6 km · 109 min drive to Sydney
Around the state median
Median $870K
High crime risk
Fire 0/100 · Crime 84/100
Highly disadvantaged
SEIFA decile 2/10 · median age 51 · 1,623 residents
Liveability Rating
41 / 100 · Ranked #993 in NSWEach bar is Booragul's rank among NSW suburbs, from 0 to 100 (higher is better).
No flood data is published for New South Wales — a blank here means we hold no data, not that there is no risk.
How do you rate the liveability in Booragul?
Local knowledge beats any dataset. Rate it and see what other residents think.
Our score
41 / 100
From schools, safety and socio-economic data — not opinion.
Residents say
…
Median House Price
Public listings dataBooragul's house market is moving higher: the median sale price reached $870,000, about 3% above where it sat a year earlier.
Houses
$870,000
3% above its 4 neighbours (median $844,500)
Based on 42 recorded sales in the last 24 months.
Typically sold in 32 days — median across 12 sales that recorded a listing period
By bedrooms
- 3 bed 27 sales $825K
- 4 bed 9 sales $1.1M
Land
$607,750
Based on only 3 sales — small sample, take as indicative.
Rental Market
Rent agreed on new leases
Jul–Sep 2026- 3-bed houses
- $700/wk
- 30 bonds
- +43% since 2021
Median weekly rent on bonds lodged for new tenancies across postcode 2284 (NSW publishes bonds by postcode, which can cover several suburbs). Change since 2021 compares the median of the first four quarters with the last four. Asking rents above come from advertised listings.
Rental affordability
June quarter 202584 Unaffordable · the average rental household in this region would pay about 36% of its income on the median rent in postcode 2284.
SGS Rental Affordability Index: a score of 100 means rent takes 30% of income, the usual housing-stress line; lower scores are less affordable. "Region" is the capital city or the rest of the state.
Is Booragul safe? Crime statistics
2025Crime in Booragul sits in the high band, with 109 incidents recorded in 2025 — down about 8% on the prior year.
109 offences
7.6% since 2024Crime Trend
Serious Road Crashes
2021–20258 crashes
where someone was killed or admitted to hospital
Where they happened
Crashes are counted where they happened, so a main road through the suburb carries people passing through; this is not a measure of risk to residents. Roads are listed with 3 or more serious crashes.
Council Flood Studies
Lake Macquarie City Council has published 14 flood studies on the NSW Flood Data Portal. The mapped flood areas are in those studies; SuburbScan does not hold them.
- North Creek (Warners Bay) Flood Risk Management Study and Plan, January 2026 2026
- Morans, Stockton, Mullards, Clacks, Melaleuca and Dora Creeks Flood Study - November 2025 2025
- Lake Macquarie City Flood Studies & Floodplain Risk Management Studies/Plans 2025
- North Creek Warners Bay Flood Study (Final Report) January 2025 2025
- Flood Studies for Eight Residual Lake Macquarie Waterway Tributary Catchments 2021
Schools
Five schools serve Booragul, and results are mixed — some outperforming peer-suburb schools, some below. Booragul Public School leads the pack.
- • 1,328 students across 4 schools (avg 332)
- • Sectors: 3 Government, 2 Catholic
- • ICSEA 890-1026, median 928 (below the national baseline of 1000)
- • Largest: St Paul's Catholic College (636 students)
Primary
Secondary
Combined
Walkability
Booragul is somewhat walkable on foot — at 61/100, a short cluster of errands work on foot but most trips still benefit from a car.
Public transport
Weekday and weekend service frequency across every stop inside Booragul.
- Peak (7-9am + 5-7pm)
- 59.0 arrivals/hr
- Off-peak weekday
- 34.1 arrivals/hr
- Saturday
- 18.0 arrivals/hr
- Median peak wait
- 1 min
- Span of service
- 21.0 hours
- Direct to CBD (peak)
- 60 min wait
Scheduled service only, based on the 21 October 2026 timetable. Reliability (delays, cancellations) not measured.
NBN connectivity
The internet access technology available across NBN premises in Booragul.
- Full-fibre (FTTP) share
- 47%
- Premises covered
- 783
NBN Co fixed-line and fixed-wireless premises, as at 30 December 2025. Higher-quality technologies (full fibre) score above copper, wireless, and satellite. Actual speeds depend on your plan.
Amenities
Lake Macquarie: council population
The three add up to the change above. These are council-wide figures from the ABS, not figures for this suburb alone — this suburb's own population is in the census section above.
Socio-economic profile
The ABS scores 4 small areas inside this suburb and averages them into the single decile above. They fall into 2 different deciles — a narrow range, so the average describes the suburb closely.
Booragul is home to about 1,600 residents, with a median age of 51 — noticeably older than the national figure of 38. Median household income runs at $58,000 a year, with unemployment at 5.1%.
2021 Census · change since 2016
Population
1,623
Median Age
51
Median Household Income
$57,928/yr
Census Median Rent
$320/wk
Census Median Mortgage
$1,636/mo
Avg Household Size
2.3
Median Personal Income
$31,876/yr
Unemployment Rate
5.1%
Unoccupied Dwellings
5.3%
Total Dwellings
584
Owner-Occupier Rate
59.5%
Houses
84.9%
Rental Stress
28.7%
Mortgage Stress
33.9%
Work From Home
15.6%
Dwelling Types
Property Ownership
79 rented from a state or territory housing authority and 27 from a community housing provider, as a share of the 216 rented dwellings above — not of all dwellings.
Demographics
- Born in Australia
- 81.5%
- English Spoken at Home
- 85.0%
- Employment Rate
- 39%
- Completed Year 12
- 25.7%
Occupations
Religion
Country of Birth (overseas)
Largest overseas birthplaces, as a share of all residents.
When They Arrived
Share of all residents by the year they arrived in Australia. Periods cover different numbers of years, so compare the shape rather than the bar widths.
14 residents (0.9%) arrived since 2016. Australia’s borders were closed to most arrivals from March 2020, so the last two years of that period are much smaller than the ones before them — nationally 260,799 people arrived in 2019 against 28,521 in 2021.
Where New Residents Came From
Where residents aged five and over lived five years before the 2021 Census, for those who lived somewhere else.
2.5% of residents (39) lived in a capital city five years earlier, most of them in Sydney (28).
Top places newcomers came from, as a share of the 1,551 residents aged five and over. Areas are ABS statistical regions. Small counts are approximate: the ABS adjusts every figure slightly to protect privacy.
Languages Spoken at Home
Top languages other than English, as a share of all residents.
Age Distribution
Family & Household Composition
Commute to Work
1% of employed residents work in a capital's city centre (8 of 545).
City centre: the ABS area around each capital's CBD, such as Sydney Inner City or Perth City (which takes in Subiaco and Leederville). 2021 Census place of work.
Local Jobs
People who work in this suburb against employed people who live here, 2021 Census.
About 749 people work here; 545 employed residents live here.
Roughly as many jobs as working residents (1.4 per resident). At least 25% of the people who work here must live elsewhere.
Counts are by place of work and place of usual residence. The ABS counts jobs in zones; where a zone spans several places, its jobs are shared out by land use. The ABS also adjusts every figure slightly to protect privacy.
Education
Cars per Dwelling
Council Rates
Households face an average residential rates bill of $1,708 a year through Lake Macquarie based on 2024 figures.
How this land is zoned
- Residential 66%
- Parks and recreation 16%
- Infrastructure and transport 11%
- Environmental 6%
- Zones under 1% 1%
Zoning sets what may be built, not what is there today. A single address can sit in a different zone to the suburb around it — the property page shows the zone for one address.
Building Approvals: Lake Macquarie
In the year to August 2026, 1,212 new dwellings were approved across Lake Macquarie. That mix is 846 houses and 366 units. Approvals are up 1.6% on the same period a year earlier.
Aboriginal Land Council
Aboriginal land in this area is administered by the Biraban Local Aboriginal Land Council.
Local Aboriginal Land Councils are statutory bodies under the Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1983, responsible for land claims and land management for their members. Their boundaries are administrative and are not a statement of whose Country this is. NSW does not publish a register of Aboriginal parties by area — they are registered for each project.
Air Quality
MODERATEPM2.5 averaged 6.1 µg/m³ in 2025 — below Australia's NEPM annual standard (8 µg/m³), slightly above the stricter WHO guideline (5 µg/m³). 4 days exceeded the daily threshold of 25 µg/m³.
PM10 averaged 16.5 µg/m³ · NO₂ averaged 0.53 pphm. Days over the limit in 2025: PM10 2 · NO₂ 0 · ozone 1.
From the Wallsend monitoring station, 10.6 km away.
Climate & Setting
from Newcastle Nobbys Signal Station AWS, 18.7 kmHigh rainfall — warm summers, mild winters.
- Elevation
- 17 m
- above sea level, at the suburb centre
- Distance to the ocean
- 9.9 km
- Annual rainfall
- 1,025 mm
- 91 rainy days
- Summer max (Jan)
- 25.4°C
- 4 days ≥ 35°C
- Winter min (Jul)
- 10.2°C
- 0 frost days ≤ 0°C
Elevation is the ground at the suburb centre, from Geoscience Australia's National Digital Elevation Model. Approximate — it reads high in dense built-up areas. It is a measure of height above sea level and not an indicator of flood risk, which depends on height above nearby waterways.
Industrial Emissions Nearby
5 facilities within 5 km- 2.4 kmOther Petroleum and Coal Product ManufacturingTop reported: Sulfur dioxide · Oxides of Nitrogen · Carbon monoxide
- 3.4 kmCoal MiningTop reported: Fluoride compounds · Manganese & compounds · Mercury & compounds
- 3.6 kmCoal MiningTop reported: Particulate Matter ≤10.0 µm (PM10) · Oxides of Nitrogen · Carbon monoxide
- 4.2 kmSewerage and Drainage ServicesTop reported: Hydrogen sulfide · Ammonia (total)
- 4.9 kmSewerage and Drainage ServicesTop reported: Hydrogen sulfide · Ammonia (total)
EV adoption
In postcode 2284, 98 of 10,542 registered light vehicles are battery-electric on 31 January 2025. A further 3.9% (411 vehicles) are hybrid or plug-in hybrid, taking the non-petrol, non-diesel share to 4.8%.
Rooftop solar
In postcode 2284, 2,690 rooftop-solar systems totalling 18.5 MW have been installed since 2001, against 5,044 dwellings recorded in the 2021 Census. 216 went up in the last year.
Counts every system certified since 2001, so a roof re-fitted with a newer system is counted twice, and small commercial systems are included alongside houses — useful for comparing postcodes, not an estimate of how many homes have working panels today.
2026 covers part of the year only, to 2026-07.
First Home Owner Grant
FY2026-27$10,000 for new homes priced up to $600,000.
Off-the-plan or contracted-build value cap is $750,000 (vs $600,000 for completed new homes). Stamp duty concessions are a separate scheme (First Home Buyers Assistance).
Mortgage repayments
2 mortgage brokers are registered in postcode 2284.
Transfer duty at the owner-occupier rate, and it excludes first home buyer concessions — those can cut it substantially or remove it entirely. Excludes legal, inspection and lender fees. Check with Revenue NSW
The First Home Owner Grant applies to newly built homes only, so it isn't available on an established purchase. A first home buyer building or buying new under $600,000 may qualify for $10,000 — see what qualifies with Revenue NSW.
At $870,000 this is $270,000 above the $600,000 First Home Owner Grant cap. A first home buyer may qualify for $10,000 on a newly built home — check eligibility with Revenue NSW.
A deposit under 20% usually attracts Lenders Mortgage Insurance, which this doesn't include.
Principal and interest over 30 years, fixed rate. Excludes fees, offset, redraw and LMI. Default rate is the median comparison rate across 1788 advertised products as at 2026-10-27 — indicative only, and not an offer. Your rate depends on the lender, your deposit and your circumstances. Not financial advice.
Federal Electorate
Currently held by Dan Repacholi Australian Labor Party
| Year | Winner | 2PP ALP | 2PP LNP | Swing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Dan Repacholi | 59.5% | 40.5% | +4.7 |
| 2022 | Dan Repacholi | 54.0% | 46.0% | -1.1 |
| 2019 | Joel Fitzgibbon | 53.0% | 47.0% | +9.5 |
Results are per division — federal electoral boundaries are redrawn periodically, so the history reflects this division's past, not necessarily the exact suburb's voters across time.
State Electorate
Currently held by Greg Piper Independent
Next state election: 13 March 2027.
| Year | Winner | Won with |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | Greg Piper IND | 74.1% |
| 2019 | Greg Piper IND | 72.1% |
| 2015 | Greg Piper IND | 60.7% |
Results are per district. Districts were last redrawn in 2021, so results from before then describe the district of that name, not necessarily this suburb's voters. Results: © State of New South Wales through the NSW Electoral Commission, CC BY 4.0, adapted.
Looking at a specific address in Booragul?
Every figure above is a suburb average, and an average smooths over the difference between a street of family homes and a block of flats. Look up one address and you get the census for the few hundred people around it, its own nearest schools and stops, and what the state has mapped for that block.
- The census for a few hundred neighbours, not all 1,623 residents
- Nearest and zoned schools, with the walk from that door
- Flood, bushfire and noise mapping, where the state publishes it
Free to look up. Subscribers see every section in full — $29/month.
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Common questions about Booragul
Is Booragul a safe place to live?
Recorded crime in Booragul is high (84/100, ranked against other NSW suburbs on offences per resident). Offences against shops, venues and visitors are divided by the people who live here, so suburbs with large daytime or visitor populations rank higher than living there may feel.
What natural hazards affect Booragul?
Booragul has no recorded bushfire history. These are suburb-wide figures; check the address, as flood and bushfire exposure change street by street.
Is Booragul a good place to live?
Booragul has a SuburbScan Liveability grade of C (41/100), ranked against other NSW suburbs on school quality (25%), safety (25%), SEIFA socio-economic advantage (25%), walkability (15%) and CBD access (10%). Whether it suits you depends on what you weigh — each of those is on this page.
What is the population of Booragul?
Booragul, NSW had a population of 1,623 at the 2021 Australian Bureau of Statistics census.
What is the postcode for Booragul, NSW?
The postcode for Booragul, NSW is 2284.
How far is Booragul from Sydney?
Booragul is 142 km from Sydney CBD by road, about 109 minutes by car in normal traffic. Distance is the most-direct driving route, not straight-line.
What is the median household income in Booragul?
At the 2021 ABS Census, median household income in Booragul was $57,928 a year. It is the most recent suburb-level income figure until 2026 Census results are released in 2027.
What is the median weekly rent in Booragul?
There are too few current rental listings in Booragul for a reliable median. At the 2021 ABS Census the median weekly rent was $320, across all dwelling types.
What is the median age in Booragul?
The median age of residents in Booragul was 51 at the 2021 ABS Census.
How are the schools in Booragul?
There are 5 schools inside the Booragul boundary: 1 above and 2 below similar schools on NAPLAN, compared with same-state, same-type schools of similar socio-educational advantage (ICSEA).
Is Booragul walkable?
Booragul scores 61/100 on the SuburbScan Walkability Score, making it somewhat walkable. The score is a weighted average of public transport, schools, parks, supermarkets, GPs, pharmacies, childcare, and hospitals within walking distance.
What is the air quality in Booragul?
The nearest government air-quality monitoring station to Booragul (Wallsend) recorded a 2025 annual mean PM2.5 of 6.1 µg/m³ and PM10 of 16.5 µg/m³. That puts Booragul below the Australian NEPM annual standard of 8 µg/m³ but above the stricter WHO guideline of 5 µg/m³.
What is the weather like in Booragul?
At the nearest Bureau of Meteorology station to Booragul, Newcastle Nobbys Signal Station AWS (18.7 km away), summer days average 25.4°C, winter nights 10.2°C, 1,025 mm of rain a year over 91 rainy days, and 4 days a year above 35°C over 2006-2026.
Is the First Home Owner Grant available in Booragul?
First-home buyers in NSW may be eligible for $10,000 towards new homes with a purchase price up to $600,000. The grant is administered by Revenue NSW; confirm current eligibility before signing a contract — state rules and amounts can change.
What council does Booragul belong to?
Booragul sits within the Lake Macquarie local government area. Council rates, planning approvals, and waste collection fall under this LGA.
How much are council rates in Booragul?
The average residential rates bill through Lake Macquarie is $1,708 a year (2024). Every suburb in this LGA shares the same schedule — individual bills vary with land value.
How much is being built near Booragul?
Across Lake Macquarie, 1,212 new residential dwellings were approved in the year to August 2026 (source: ABS Building Approvals). That's up 1.6% on the same period a year earlier. These are LGA-level totals — every suburb in the council shares the same figure.
Which federal electorate is Booragul in?
Booragul sits within the federal Division of Hunter, currently held by Dan Repacholi (Australian Labor Party).
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Data freshness
- Census · 2021
- Median sale prices · Oct 2026
- For-sale & rental market · Oct 2026
- Council rates · FY 2024–25
- Building approvals · Aug 2026
- Schools · 2025
- Public transport · Oct 2026
- NBN connectivity · Dec 2025
- Crime · 2025
- Road crashes · 2021–2025
- Air quality · 2025
- Climate · 2006–2026
- Socio-economic (SEIFA) · 2021
- EV adoption · Jan 2025
- First Home Owner Grant · Sep 2026
- Federal electorate · 2025
- State electorate · 2023
- Amenities · Sep 2026
- Health & emergency facilities · Sep 2026
- Industrial emissions (NPI) · 2024/2025
- Coastal erosion · 1988–2025
- Aircraft noise · 2024
Vintages show when each source's data is from. See all data sources.
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Information shown is provided as-is from Australian government and commercial data sources.
Always verify with the relevant authority before making property decisions.
See Data Sources and How We Calculate for details.