Yass

Development Activity

Schools in Yass iICSEA: school advantage index. 1000 = national avg, higher = more advantaged

Demographics

The median age of 42 is 2.0 years above national, and the trajectory is aging: the senior share rose 5.0 points while the working-age share fell 4.0 points over the decade. Only 9.8% of residents were born overseas, which is 11.8 points below the national figure, marking Yass as far more Australian-born than the country at large. Ancestry leans heavily Anglo-Celtic, led by English (2,838), Irish (947) and Scottish (740), and the largest non-English language group, Punjabi, counts just 12 speakers. University qualifications reach 28.2%, 1.9 points below national, consistent with a town where trades and public-sector roles outweigh degree-gated work. Average household size is 2.5, matching national exactly, and couples with children (2,251 families) outnumber couples without (1,445), a more family-weighted profile than the older median age alone would imply.

Tenure tilts toward active buyers: 41.3% carry a mortgage, 34.3% own outright and 24.4% rent. Mortgage holders outnumbering outright owners signals a market people are still moving into, not just holding. The stock is overwhelmingly detached at 89.0%, with apartments at 3.1% and semi-detached at 7.7%, so almost every purchase is a standalone house. Three-bedroom dwellings account for 42.9% and four-plus-bedroom homes 39.9%, leaving two-bedroom stock at just 14.9%, a family-sized inventory. The median house price slipped from $700,000 in 2024 to $665,000 in 2025, a 5.0% one-year fall, while the derived median reads $676,908. Both mortgage-to-income at 23.5% and rent-to-income at 19.6% sit below the 30% stress line, a healthier affordability balance than most commuter towns near Canberra, though the 2021 affordability figure of 35.4% had worsened from 31.4% in 2011.

Community Profile

Economy & Employment

The workforce is anchored in government and care sectors: Public Administration leads at 20.6% (444 workers), Healthcare follows at 16.5% (356) and Education at 11.8% (255), with Construction at 11.2% (240) and Professional/Tech at 6.9% (149). By occupation, Professionals (606) and Community and Personal Service workers (467) top the list, ahead of Clerical (427) and Managers (415), a spread that reflects Yass functioning as a service and administrative hub for its rural district. Unemployment is low at 3.3% and the full-time employment rate is 66.1%. Participation reads 57.2%, held down because the aging profile leaves 1,854 residents not in the labour force. SEIFA places Yass mid-table: IRSAD and IEO both at decile 5 and IRSD at decile 6, while economic resources (IER) run higher at decile 7, because widespread detached home ownership lifts the wealth measure above the education and occupation scores.

Transport to Work

Yass is heavily car-dependent, as expected for a low-density town: 87.2% of commuters drive while only 1.3% use public transport and 5.5% walk or cycle, well below metropolitan public-transport shares. The town scores mid-range on disadvantage, decile 6 on IRSD and decile 5 on IRSAD, indicating a broadly settled community without the deprivation of lower deciles. Volunteering runs at 20.0%, a strong civic marker, and 8.4% of residents (542 people) need daily assistance, consistent with the older median age of 42. Rent-to-income at 19.6% keeps tenants comfortable and mortgage-to-income at 23.5% does the same for buyers, both below the 30% stress threshold. No schools are recorded inside the 99.73 km2 boundary in this dataset, so families rely on institutions in the town centre and nearby, a practical consideration given the dispersed rural footprint.

Population Forecast

Yass is growing steadily for an inland town: the population rose 22.3% over the decade and the trend points to about 1.44% a year, or roughly 192 additional residents annually. Growth is balanced rather than reliant on one source, with net internal migration near 53 a year and overseas migration close to 52. Real incomes climbed 15.5% over the decade, but affordability worsened, moving from 31.4% in 2011 to 35.4% in 2021 as prices outpaced wages. The gentrification reading is mixed: the headline stage is not gentrifying despite the 22.3% population gain, because incomes and education sit only mid-decile rather than climbing the SEIFA ladder. The classification is an established town adding people through commuter overflow from Canberra rather than wholesale demographic turnover, which keeps the family-detached character intact.

National Ranking iPercentile rank among ~15,000 AU suburbs. 90% = higher than 90% of suburbs

How Yass compares to ~15,000 Australian suburbs

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