Carnes Hill is a small, newer family suburb — roughly 1.2 km² — about 38 km south-west of the Sydney CBD in the City of Liverpool's south-west growth corridor, part of Greater Western Sydney; Wikipedia lists the suburb's establishment at 1998, and its modern history tracks the Carnes Hill Marketplace precinct built on former Inghams poultry-farming land. It has been one of the fastest-growing parts of the LGA: population jumped from 2,043 in 2016 to 3,332 in 2021 (+63.1%) as remaining estate stages completed, with a young median age of about 32 across roughly 1,000–1,100 dwellings. At the 2021 census 51.8% of residents were born in Australia, with Iraq (10.3%) and Fiji (4.9%) the next most common birthplaces, 37.3% spoke only English at home and Arabic was the main other language (8.6%). Agents and analysts describe it as a tightly held, family-focused house market centred on the Marketplace and the Carnes Hill Community and Recreation Centre, with constrained listings and low vacancy (~2.3%).
At a Glance
| Field | Details |
|---|---|
| Region | Western Sydney |
| Council (LGA) | Liverpool City Council |
| Postcode | 2171 |
| Distance to Sydney CBD | Carnes Hill is about 38 km south-west of the CBD. By public transport, allow roughly 75–95 minutes door-to-door:… |
| Median house price | ~$1.29M–$1.43M across trackers (thin market — only 26–27 house sales in 12 months): realestate.com.au median house price $1,329,444 (26 sales, +10% YoY); YIP/CoreLogic median house sale price $1,432,000 (27 sales, +4.15% YoY); Allhomes median house sale price $1,430,000; Cotality/OnTheHouse AVM median house value $1,286,473 (31 May 2026) (mid-2026) |
| Median unit price | $906,003 — Cotality/OnTheHouse AVM median unit value (31 May 2026); unit stock is minimal and YIP records no sales-based unit median |
| Typical rent | ~$850/week median house rent ; HtAG's different-basis figure is ~$704/week |
| Price growth | +4.15% YoY house price growth on the sales median ; realestate.com.au shows +10% and HtAG +8.7% YoY… |
Transport
Bus-based and car-reliant — Carnes Hill has no railway station. Transit Systems NSW route 852 runs Liverpool to Carnes Hill via Greenway Drive and Cowpasture Road, terminating at Carnes Hill Marketplace on Kurrajong Road (about 36 minutes), and route 853 links the Marketplace with Liverpool via Hoxton Park Road; Cowpasture Road, bounding the suburb on the west, is the main north–south arterial. The nearest rail stations are Edmondson Park and Leppington on the T2/T5 lines (both opened in 2015) in the adjacent suburbs to the south/south-east, a short drive or connecting bus ride from central Carnes Hill.
Schools
No government school stands within Carnes Hill — no school named 'Carnes Hill Public School' exists in the NSW list of government schools — but Greenway Park Public School, a K–6 government school opened in 2000, is officially listed to Carnes Hill by the NSW Department of Education and is named by Wikipedia as the suburb's local primary school, with its Wyattville Drive campus on the boundary with neighbouring West Hoxton. Holy Spirit Catholic Primary School Carnes Hill — Catholic systemic primary at 25 Main Street, inside Carnes Hill itself, established in 2002 during the development of the Carnes Hill parish and built out to about 640 students by late 2010 (school website; Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney). Secondary students are served from just across the boundaries: John Edmondson High School, the state high school opened in 2005 immediately south in neighbouring Horningsea Park, and Clancy Catholic College, the Holy Spirit parish's secondary school in neighbouring West Hoxton.
Shopping & Amenities
Carnes Hill Marketplace is the suburb's — and the district's — main shopping centre: Woolworths acquired the former Inghams poultry site and delivered Stage 1 in 1999 (its supermarket plus about 20 speciality shops), a major Stage 2 expansion in 2007 added Big W and about 26 more tenants, and the centre now runs to ~50 speciality stores on a 65,000 m² site at the corner of Cowpasture and Kurrajong Roads, with Woolworths, Big W and Dan Murphy's (delivered as a standalone building fronting Cowpasture Road) as anchors; it is owned and managed by Charter Hall (centre website; The Sydney Development Journal). Perimeter lots along Cowpasture and Kurrajong Roads have since been developed with a service station, Domino's and a medical centre (SDJ). On Kurrajong Road about 220 m north of the Marketplace, the Carnes Hill Community and Recreation Centre — library, gym, skate park, playground, café, basketball courts, cycling and walking paths and a public plaza with water feature and public art — was built by Liverpool Council as the heart of its Carnes Hill Recreation Precinct: it was under construction and near completion in late 2020, with Council adopting the precinct's Stage II masterplan in November 2020 (NSW Planning Portal PP_2018_LPOOL_002; Liverpool Council agenda, 25 Nov 2020).
Parks & Outdoors
Compact but green for its size: Cotality counts 5 parks covering about 4.3% of the suburb's 1.2 km². The Carnes Hill Recreation Precinct on Kurrajong Road delivers the skate park, playground, basketball courts, cycling/walking paths and public plaza of the Community and Recreation Centre, and the suburb has two AFL fields and is home to the South West Tigers AFL club. OpenStreetMap records neighbourhood parks including Havard Park within the suburb (OpenStreetMap/Nominatim).
Property Market
The median house price in Carnes Hill was around ~$1.29M–$1.43M across trackers (thin market — only 26–27 house sales in 12 months): realestate.com.au median house price $1,329,444 (26 sales, +10% YoY); YIP/CoreLogic median house sale price $1,432,000 (27 sales, +4.15% YoY); Allhomes median house sale price $1,430,000; Cotality/OnTheHouse AVM median house value $1,286,473 (31 May 2026) (mid-2026). See our full Sydney property price map for how the suburb compares across the city. Carnes Hill is a small, thin sales market — only 26–27 house sales in the past 12 months across ~1,000–1,100 dwellings in just 1.2 km² — so medians swing on a handful of transactions. Trackers cluster houses at ~$1.29M–$1.43M: sales-based medians $1.33–1.43M, Cotality's AVM at the lower end ($1,286,473). HtAG's 'typical price' of ~$1,647K (+8.7% YoY, a different basis) is the outlier; the old $1.1–1.4M guide band is now low for newer 4-bedroom stock, while 1–2-bed villas rent or sell well under $1M. Stock is overwhelmingly post-2000s detached family housing around the Marketplace, and population grew +63.1% between 2016 and 2021 as the estate built out; vacancy is ~2.3%.
New Developments
Carnes Hill's story is the build-out of a suburb gazetted in the late 1990s whose modern housing estates and community infrastructure arrived from the 2010s — population grew 63.1% between 2016 and 2021 (2,043 to 3,332) as remaining residential stages completed. The Carnes Hill Community and Recreation Centre (library, gym, skate park, playground, basketball courts, café, public plaza) was delivered under Liverpool Council's Carnes Hill Recreation Precinct — under construction and near completion in late 2020, with Council adopting the precinct's Stage II masterplan in November 2020 (NSW Planning Portal; Liverpool Council agenda). At the Marketplace, Charter Hall has been intensifying the centre's remaining land: a planning proposal endorsed by Council in February 2018 (PP_2018_LPOOL_002) rezoned a 2,125 m² RE1 parcel to B2 Local Centre to fold it into the centre's redevelopment concept plan, perimeter lots gained a service station, Domino's, medical centre and standalone Dan Murphy's, and a KFC-led DA (childcare centre and car-service outlet) on two vacant Cowpasture Road parcels was refused by Council in 2023, with a revised proposal re-lodged in 2024 for reassessment (NSW Planning Portal; The Sydney Development Journal).
Jobs & Local Economy
Retail and services at Carnes Hill Marketplace — the district's main centre serving the Hoxton Park–Middleton Grange residential corridor, anchored by Woolworths, Big W and Dan Murphy's with ~50 speciality stores — plus the library, leisure and community facilities of the Carnes Hill Community and Recreation Centre are the suburb's main local employers (The Sydney Development Journal; Liverpool Council). Most residents commute out of the suburb: Liverpool CBD and the Liverpool Hospital health and education precinct are roughly 15–20 minutes away by bus (routes 852/853) or car along Cowpasture Road, and the M5/M7 logistics corridor and the Western Sydney International Airport employment lands are the area's growth job draws.
Nearby Suburbs
Hoxton Park, Horningsea Park, Prestons, West Hoxton
Sources & method
Researched 4 September 2026 from named public sources — census and government records, transport authorities, council and planning documents — plus published sales data. Where sources disagree on a figure, the guide says so rather than picking one.
Sources cited in this guide:
Corrections are welcome — if something here is out of date or wrong, tell us and we will fix it.
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