If you’re looking for that iconic home among the gum trees with a sheep or two and a kangaroo, you’d better be prepared to pay. According to Australia’s Bureau of Statistics, house prices have risen over the past 12 months in every capital city except Darwin.

Sydney experienced the most dramatic increase at 7.2 percent over the last year. The median house price in Sydney now eclipses au$1 million (us$861,000). Combined, the capitals experienced an average climb of 4.6 percent, with mean prices sitting at just over $755,000.

Even those who gave up the classic home on the waterfront idea, turning to owning a unit, the prospects aren’t great. In Sydney, a unit still costs over $569,000—having risen 9.3 percent over the past year. The lack of affordability requires many to rent or take on a lifelong mortgage.

The International Monetary Fund ranks Australia as the world’s third least affordable country to own your own house, just behind Belgium and Canada. Added to that lack of affordability is Australia’s unemployment, which is currently at an all-time high of 6 percent. While low by world standards, it is steadily growing.

Part of the reason for Australia’s sky-high house prices is that the nation’s economy didn’t fall as hard as in many other nations during the financial crisis of 2007-2008. That is where the real danger lies. As bad as it may be when people can’t afford to own houses, society will suffer more when the prices fall.

The history of 2007-2008 shows that plummeting house prices are a harbinger of recession. Australia’s housing market is far out of sync with the rest of the economy. This is the hallmark of a housing bubble.

When the United States crashed in 2008, Australia experienced a dip in house prices, but not the same plunge. Grants to first homeowners, stimulus packages, a booming mine industry and foreign investment led to a quick turnaround. Today, however, Australia’s housing market is precariously perched on a much higher ledge. Had it fallen in 2008, it would have hurt. If it falls now, it will be excruciating.

Economic analyst Mike Shedlock says Australia’s housing bubble “exceeds the height of the bubble that long ago burst in the U.S.”

Deputy managing director of the imf Min Zhu stated that “boom-bust patterns in house prices preceded more than two thirds of the recent 50 systemic banking crises.” If one word could describe Australia’s soaring house prices as they blow the million-dollar roof, it would be boom.

So how long until bust?

Housing prices cannot be sustained at their current level of growth. It mirrors the housing bubble that caused Californian home prices to nosedive. As Trumpet columnist Robert Morley warned in 2010, “Pay close attention, Australia. Los Angelification is coming to a city near you.”

Yet new homes are still being built. Aussies are still taking out lifelong loans to buy a house, hoping prices will continue to rise so they can sell the house and pocket the excess. But people are buying outside their means. Half the residents in Sydney are paying for $1 million-plus houses. How many own those homes outright?

The latest reports from the Bureau of Statistics warn just how inflated Australia’s housing bubble is. Whether it pops today, tomorrow or a year from now, one thing is certain: The longer the prices inflate, the more it will hurt when the pressure is applied.

Read Robert Morley’s article “Is Australia’s Housing Bubble Bigger Than America’s?” It explains the condemning parallels between Australia’s burgeoning housing market and that of the now-collapsed market in California. And just as markets in America fell, so too will they fall in Australia. And they will fall hard.