Ultimo Suburb Review

Summary: Essentially little more than an extended pocket of the Sydney CBD, Ultimo differs slightly from absolute-central Sydney in its disproportionately high percentage of students which call it (a temporary) home.

This is an incredibly dense suburb consisting almost entirely of apartments with only a small smattering of rowhouse-style terraces to break things up, so highrise and mid-rise living is the name of the game here.

Ultra-convenient given its proximity to everything else city-centric within walking distance nearby, the suburb offers easy access to everything central Sydney has to offer – although the associated high property prices per square metre, crowds and noise make it more of a choice for those who don’t need too much space or greenery to be satisfied.

Key stats

If there were any statistics out there for “highest ratio of Macbooks per capita” for suburbs in Australia, it’d be surprising if Ultimo ranked anything less than tops.

A student hub through and through largely oriented around the University of Technology Sydney / UTS (TAFE is also here, too), Ultimo is a slice of absolute-city living dotted with the associated mixture of convenience stores, takeaway restaurants, mixed retailers and varied public transport options required for living efficient – if slightly stressful – daily city life.

A university of (inter)national renown, UTS (and its hideous yet immediately recognisable main tower) has proven a massive drawcard for international students in recent years, and as a result the demographics of Ultimo skew both heavily young, and heavily foreign.

Much of the investment and development in the area is powered on the back of this overseas investment, with many smaller dining and drinking spots able to subsist almost entirely on the back of student coin.

Add in its proximity to Haymarket / Chinatown, and there’s a strong East Asian influence reflected in both its restaurants and the people and cars which populate its streets.

Its “new money” influx means the suburb has a lot of modern additions which have been overlaid on top of what is quite an old area of Sydney, with its educational facilities being constantly expanded, ultra-high-speed internet availability the norm, and retail hubs like Broadway on Ultimo’s edge having been kept up to date and enlarged as well.

Add in its close proximity to Central Station, and Ultimo is hard to beat in terms of raw convenience for those wanting to survive without a car, as far as Sydney suburbs go.

Study study, eat eat, shop shop

This convenience can come at the cost of noise, depending on which part of Ultimo you’re visiting or living in, as it’s basically a suburb with two fairly distinct sides.

There’s small pockets of the suburb on either extremity populated with terrace-style houses and more peaceful (if somewhat gritty) streets, but for the rest it’s almost exclusively high-density living, in which you’ll find yourself immediately amongst the crowds upon exiting your apartment building.

This is reflected on the roads, as its central location makes driving in the area as painful as could be expected. Peak hour traffic heading over Sydney’s main bridges can be intense, while parking is incredibly hard to find – even for residents – and comes at a premium for everyone else.

Of course, if you’re basing yourself in Ultimo it’s highly likely you’ll either be a professional working in the CBD or a student walking to study, but even on those days you’re trying to get out of the city for a getaway this can be a negative factor.

The Pros and Cons of City Living

Property-wise, houses are scarce due to their limited quantity and the fact they seldom go on the market, and those that exist are mostly the aforementioned narrow terrace-style offerings with a smaller physical footprint.

Its apartment living varies greatly depending on size, and jumps up massively in price with every additional bedroom you add; reasonably-priced studios and even one-bedders can still be found here in relative abundance, but have been largely built with capitalising on student living in mind.

They’re still not “cheap” though given how small they are, and even when renting you’ll likely find yourself forking out in the realm of $600 to $650 a week for a slot in a building that’s heavily populated by students.

Purchase prices for anything in the 2 bedroom range immediately jump up to around the $1.1 million mark for something relatively unimpressive, and some of its newer multi-bedroom offerings are next-level extravagant with a next-tier level of pricing to boot.

Despite its potential for a “concrete jungle” feel given its location, Ultimo does offer some nice pockets of greenery throughout that are decent examples of urban design. There’s multiple smaller green areas, and Wentworth Park offers a large and open – if unremarkable and fairly uninteresting – flat green space for the exercise of both pets and kids.

Pet owners will find it a chore for apartment approval here however, and the competition for apartments and their relatively small size coupled with the hectic nature of its main streets don’t make for the greatest environment for walking a dog.

“Its “new money” influx means the suburb has a lot of modern additions which have been overlaid on top of what is quite an old area of Sydney.”

Families who can luck into a terrace house will find Ultimo’s education-oriented nature includes formative education as well, as multiple private and public schools are right nearby.

There’s not a great deal of special things to do in Ultimo itself outside of dining and shopping, but the both the connectivity of Central Station to elsewhere in Sydney as well as its outer regions combined with the ability to walk, ride or bus to dozens of attractions not far away more than make up for this.

Head down to the harbour and Pyrmont, go check out and dine at Chippendale, hit up Westfield in the CBD – all of these just skim the surface of what’s possible when living in Ultimo.

Ironically, Ultimo itself is a little bit more low-key in terms of entertainment offerings; as a result it’s somewhat safer than these other more lively, alcohol-fuelled “nightlife” suburbs that surround it, reflected in a crime rate that is around average by Sydney standards (and substantially lower than these other pub-and-club oriented CBD suburbs).

The Verdict

If you’re the type who puts a premium on convenience and always likes having something to do – and don’t mind dealing with city bustle or a smaller residence, plus higher prices to boot – Ultimo is a highly convenient option for inner city Sydney living.

Other than that, the suburb doesn’t have much individual character or charm, and is more utilitarian in nature; overall it’s mostly a means to an end for both CBD workers and students alike that serves as a springboard to other places for either work for play nearby.

For this purpose, it ticks a lot of boxes; for most other lifestyles, there are countless better places in Sydney to live than here.