Hi Mary, it probably comes down to demographics. Britain is wet and green all over with many large cities and you've had a couple of thousand years to establish them. Australia has around 24 million people who mainly cling to the coastal fringe. Go more than a few hundred kilometres from the coast and you enter the GAFA, desert. Nothing to attract industry, no water and not much grows there so it can't support any sort of large towns. That's why land is so expensive here. Melbourne and Sydney are amongst the most expensive cities in the world to buy a house. Come down for a holiday. I'll even put you up.