The shark was spotted today near the Busselton Jetty. Credit:Kristjan Porm "It's significant, but prices have been dropping here since 2012, there's probably been a 50 per cent drop in price since then." In 2011 the suburb of Nickol in Karratha recorded a median house price of more than $1 million. The latest figures show Karratha's median house price is now $440,000, according to REIWA. The rapid decline in Karratha's property value has been attributed to numerous factors, particularly the mining downturn.

The blue waters near Albany have also proved popular to homebuyers. Credit:Frances Andrijich Mr Naulls also believes a higher number of sales last financial year compared to previous financial years had contributed to the decline. But while there have been many losses, some are winning. "On the positive side, 90 per cent of sales that have happened in the last 12 months have been to owner/occupier and in particular, first home buyers," Mr Naulls said. "That grows the population and makes things affordable and sustainable."

But Mr Naulls said, for some, the worst may be yet to come. "The stats indicate that prices should reduce much further," he said. Karratha is not the only WA mining town that has taken a hit. Port Hedland dropped 12 per cent but still had a significant median price of $880,000, while South Hedland had a modest drop of 4.6 per cent to $711,000, according to REIWA. In the state's south it's a different story, with Albany emerging as the best performing regional centre for property over the last financial year.

The Albany Urban Area had a 5.3 per cent growth in median house price over the last year, lifting it to $389,750. The regional city saw 456 house sales, 42 unit sales and 200 land sales over the last year. Better performing suburbs included Bayonet Head (up 8.8 per cent to a median of $397,000), Mount Melville (up 5 per cent to $380,000) and Spencer Park (up 4.9 per cent to $350,000). REIWA's Branch Chairman for Albany, Barry Panizza, said although any growth was good it had to be seen in context.

"The lift in median price over the last year really only brings us back to where we were five years ago because the market has been weak for that long," Mr Panizza said. "However, it's encouraging to think that we might now be returning to a better position of forward growth and it gives buyers and sellers a bit more confidence. "Turnover, however, was down 10 per cent on last year which could be attributed to fewer properties on the market and this also helped with price growth." Mr Panizza said growth should hold as the available land in some areas is being taken up quickly with no new subdivisions on the horizon in some residential suburbs. The second best performing regional centre was the Busselton Urban Area, which experienced 3.4 per cent growth over the financial year, following on from positive growth in previous years.

Busselton's best performing suburb was Abbey with a median price of $625,000, up by 15.7 per cent over the year and averaging almost four per cent growth each year over the past five years. In third place was Goldfields/Esperance with 3.1 per cent growth, although the suburb of Esperance itself did better with 4.3 per cent growth based on 25 sales and a median price of $365.000. The suburb of Kalgoorlie enjoyed 7.6 per cent growth to $317,500, while Piccadilly had very good growth of 20.2 per cent to $375,000. Several regional centres had zero growth or very modest fluctuations, such as Mandurah and Bunbury while many others went backwards. Across the regions as a whole, price growth was just under 1 per cent, lifting the country median house price to $380,000.