# Brisbane lifts rates 3.97 per cent, the lowest rise announced so far

Brisbane City Council's $3.9 billion budget adds $1.22 a week to the average owner-occupier's rates and raises the pensioner rebate to $1,350. What sits behind the headline.

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Brisbane City Council's budget for 2026-27, handed down on Wednesday 17 June, raises general rates by 3.97 per cent. The council's budget summary puts that at about $1.22 a week for the average owner-occupier and about 70 cents a week for a property on the minimum general rate.

It is the lowest increase announced by a large South East Queensland council this month. Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner, in his budget speech, set it against the Reserve Bank's inflation forecast of 4.8 per cent and described it as well below that mark. The $3.9 billion budget also raises the pensioner rebate, keeps the $60 discount for paying on time and, according to Redland Bayside News, takes on no new borrowings.

<div class="keyfacts">
<div><b>3.97%</b><span>rise in general rates for 2026-27</span></div>
<div><b>$1.22</b><span>a week more for the average owner-occupier</span></div>
<div><b>$949.64</b><span>minimum general rate, owner-occupied house</span></div>
</div>
<p class="src">Brisbane City Council, budget summary and Lord Mayor's budget speech, 2026-27.</p>

## What changes on a Brisbane rates notice

Two figures in the council's summary describe two different households. The minimum general rate is the floor: the amount charged on an owner-occupied house whose land value is too low for the ordinary calculation to reach it. For 2026-27 that floor is $949.64 a year, and the council says the increase on it is about 70 cents a week, or roughly $36 across the year.

The second figure is the average owner-occupier, whose increase is $1.22 a week. Over 52 weeks that comes to about $63. Spread over four quarterly notices, the change for that household is in the region of $16 each.

The on-time payment discount of $60 continues unchanged. The speech puts the cost of the discount to the council, which is the saving to ratepayers, at $16.7 million for the year.

Pensioners receive the largest single adjustment. The maximum pensioner rates rebate rises by $52 to $1,350 a year, and the partial rebate by $26 to $675. The Lord Mayor told the council almost 40,000 pensioners will benefit and that the rebates are worth almost $30 million this year. For a pensioner on the full rebate with an average bill, the $52 increase in the rebate covers most of the $63 or so added to the rates.

The council groups these and other measures as a $76.5 million cost-of-living package, which also counts a $2.2 million rebate for not-for-profit organisations.

## The costs the council says it absorbed

A rise below inflation has to be paid for from somewhere, and the budget speech is specific about the pressures. Transport and delivery costs on road infrastructure contracts have already increased by 15 per cent, the Lord Mayor said. Diesel for the council's buses and trucks has jumped by 90 cents a litre. Construction costs have risen by up to 20 per cent.

Other councils facing the same prices have passed more of them on. Brisbane's answer, in Mr Schrinner's words as reported by Redland Bayside News, was: "We're spending less where we can and investing more where it counts."

The same report gives the budget's financial frame. The council forecasts an operating surplus of $196 million and, for the first time in nearly a decade, plans no new borrowings, which it estimates will save ratepayers $202 million in interest. Road investment is put at a record $110 million.

Scale helps. Brisbane is by far the largest council in the state, and the fixed costs of running a city are spread over many more properties than on the coasts. That does not make the restraint automatic, but it is part of why the same fuel bill produces a smaller percentage in Brisbane than elsewhere.

## Brisbane against the other six councils

The council's central claim is comparative. The speech says Brisbane has the lowest rates of any council in South East Queensland, lower by an average of about $400 a year. The budget summary backs that with a list of how much less Brisbane's minimum general rate is than each neighbour's.

Adding each published gap to Brisbane's $949.64 gives the minimum the council is implying for the others. The chart shows six of the seven; Ipswich, at a gap of $281.36, would sit at $1,231.

<figure class="fig"><figcaption><b>Minimum general rates implied by Brisbane's comparison</b><span>Dollars a year, 2026-27, owner-occupied house</span></figcaption>
<div class="scroll"><svg viewBox="0 0 680 288" role="img" aria-label="Bar chart: minimum general rates of 949.64 dollars in Brisbane, 1297.90 on the Gold Coast, 1308.60 in Moreton Bay, 1348 in Redland, 1616.24 in Logan and 1771 on the Sunshine Coast.">
<text class="lb" x="176" y="33" text-anchor="end">Brisbane</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="14" width="214" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="414" y="33">$949.64</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="79" text-anchor="end">Gold Coast</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="60" width="293" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="493" y="79">$1,297.90</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="125" text-anchor="end">Moreton Bay</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="106" width="296" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="496" y="125">$1,308.60</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="171" text-anchor="end">Redland</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="152" width="304" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="504" y="171">$1,348.00</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="217" text-anchor="end">Logan</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="198" width="365" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="565" y="217">$1,616.24</text>
<text class="lb" x="176" y="263" text-anchor="end">Sunshine Coast</text><rect class="bar" x="190" y="244" width="400" height="28" rx="4"/><text class="lb" x="600" y="263">$1,771.00</text>
</svg></div>
<p class="src">Brisbane City Council budget summary 2026-27. Brisbane's figure is published; the others are Brisbane's minimum plus the gap the council states for each.</p></figure>

Two cautions belong with a chart like this. It is Brisbane's own comparison, published to make Brisbane's case, and the other councils may describe their minimums differently. And a minimum general rate is not a rates bill. It leaves out waste charges, separate levies and, on the Gold Coast, water and sewerage, which are on the council notice there. A fair comparison of what a household pays has to be made on whole notices.

The speech gives a second measure, saying Brisbane's rates are $405 below what people pay on average elsewhere in the south-east. That is an average across bills, not the minimum-rate gaps in the chart, and the documents read for this article do not show its workings.

On the percentage rise alone, the order is clear enough. The Sunshine Coast announced 9.7 per cent for most owner-occupiers on 1 June. The Gold Coast settled on 4.7 per cent on 15 June, after dropping a proposal for 5.7. Moreton Bay lifted its minimum general rate by 4.69 per cent, Moreton Daily reported on 12 June. Brisbane's 3.97 per cent is the only one of the four below 4 per cent.

## Why Brisbane's land values did not move this year

One pressure that other councils are managing is absent in Brisbane. The Valuer-General revalued 15 local government areas this year, with new values issued on 11 March and taking effect on 30 June, according to the Queensland Government's valuation pages. The list includes the Gold Coast, the Sunshine Coast, Ipswich and Redland. Brisbane is not on it.

That means Brisbane's 2026-27 rates are calculated on the land values already in place. When values are unchanged, an increase in the rate applies more or less evenly, and the council's 3.97 per cent is close to what most owners in a given category will see on the general rates line. In a revalued council the headline is an average around which individual bills scatter, because some suburbs' land rose much faster than others'.

It also means the question is deferred, not removed. Whenever Brisbane is next revalued, the market movement since its last valuation will arrive at once, and the council will have to decide how much of the shift between suburbs to let through.

<div class="callout"><span class="mono">Worth knowing</span><h4>The rating category matters as much as the percentage</h4>
<p>Brisbane's revenue statement for 2026-27 sets separate rating categories for owner-occupied homes, homes that are not owner-occupied, multi-residential properties and transitory accommodation. The $1.22 a week and the $949.64 minimum are owner-occupier figures. A rented house or a short-stay property is rated on its own scale.</p>
</div>

## What it means for investors and landlords

The council's summary does not give the increase or the minimum for a home that is not owner-occupied, and investors should look for their own category on the notice instead of assuming the published average applies. The definitions are in the revenue statement, which describes each category by how the property is used.

Use can change without the owner thinking of it as a rates matter. A home that was owner-occupied and is now let moves category. So does a unit that leaves the long-term rental market for short stays, which the statement treats as transitory accommodation. The category is assigned from the information the council holds, and an owner who has moved in or out is the person best placed to know whether it is still right.

Rates are also one of the costs an investor can deduct against rent, and one of the few that rises by decision of a third party. In a year when federal tax changes have made investors look harder at every holding cost, a rise of under 4 per cent in the state's largest rental market is at the gentle end of what the south-east's councils have announced.

## The State's land tax is a separate bill

Council rates and land tax are often confused because both begin with the Valuer-General's land value. They are different taxes, set by different governments. Rates are charged by the council on every property, whoever lives there. Land tax is charged by the State, through the Queensland Revenue Office, on the land a person owns at midnight on 30 June, and a home the owner lives in is generally exempt.

For a Brisbane investor, the 2026-27 land tax assessment will use the same unchanged valuations as the rates notice. The Revenue Office takes the lesser of the year's value and an averaged value when it sets the taxable figure, so a year without a revaluation is, for land tax too, a year without a jump.

Rates notices on the new charges are issued from July. The first quarter's notice is where an owner can see the category, the land value used and the rebate or discount applied, and it is the document to check against the figures the council has published.