In this difficult recovery, many of the strongest local economies have been those with a high share of educated people in their workforce, particularly areas where technology companies and other knowledge-based industries are growing most rapidly.
To determine the metro areas that are gaining brainpower in the 21stCentury, the nation’s 380 metropolitan statistical areas were scored based on three criteria.
Typical investor magnets like San Francisco, New York City, Boston, and Seattle are getting new competition from some rapidly growing markets. The coastal cities are no longer the top choices for investors: Other markets are stepping in as the ones to watch for 2015, according to Emerging Trends in Real Estate 2015, a report co-published by PwC US and the Urban Land Institute. The report is based on a survey of more than 1,000 leading real estate experts, including investors, fund managers, developers, property companies, lenders, brokers, advisers, and consultants.
Houston and Austin edged out San Francisco for the top spots this year, proving to be the top picks for real estate prospects in 2015. Charlotte, N.C., nabbed a seventh place spot on the ranking list, edging out Seattle and Boston; while Nashville, ranked No. 14, topped Manhattan.
Labor Day marks the end of summer – and the end of the traditional house-hunting season. Based on properties viewed on the Trulia website for the full years of 2011-2013, home search activity jumps in March, stays high through summer, and then falls below the annual average in September and stays that way until the new year begins. Nationally, home searches for September and October combined are 6% below the annual average.
Does that mean that everyone looking to buy or sell a home in 2014 has missed the boat? Not necessarily. Every local market has its own seasonal pattern for house hunting. Comparing September and October search activity with annual averages in 2011-2013, we found markets where the autumn slowdown is slight. And there are a handful of local housing markets where autumn is actually prime house-hunting season – mostly vacation areas that are in the mountains and forests but not near the beach.
Here’s a link to local events in the Seattle and Puget Sound areas!
The median house price in Seattle just set a record, topping the 2007 peak for the first time since the Great Recession.
The median price of a house that sold in the city last month was $543,500, up 16.9 percent from a year earlier and 8.9 percent from June, the Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported last Wednesday. The previous peak was $501,000, in August 2007.
When it comes to building a booming real estate business, you’ve got to know where the next hot group of buyers and sellers may be focusing their home seeking-attentions. Popular beliefs tell us that millennials—those between the age of 18 and 34—just aren’t buying homes. Right?
Not so fast. The official homeownership rate published by the Census gives a misleading picture of homeownership trends. In fact, homeownership among young adults is not too far off from where demographics say it should be.
And, as it turns out, young adult homeownership is actually on the rise. Is your market poised to become the next hotbed of young homeowners?
Recent Census Bureau findings show that millennials are flocking to big-city suburbs and lower-density cities. Check out these 10 cities, which made the list of the top 10 metros for millennial population growth—they may just be the next hottest real estate for millennial home buyers and sellers!
Summer has eased the drought of available homes for sale in Greater Seattle, and sales are growing at a pace not seen previously this year.
After five months of declining sales activity compared with a year earlier, the number of June sales was up 2 percent annually, and the supply of homes for sale grew by almost 6 percent, according to a report Thursday by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service.
The larger inventory hasn’t lessened competition among buyers in the most sought-after areas, said Mike Gain, president of Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Northwest Real Estate.
“We don’t have enough supply of homes for sale in desirable neighborhoods to satisfy the demand,” he said. “In those areas, it is just like a feeding frenzy when a house goes on the market,” he said.
The median price of homes sold in King County has been steadily increasing since February, last month reaching $453,500, a 6 percent increase from a year ago.
Denver tops the list of more than 140 metros where homes are on the market for the fewest number of days, unseating Oakland, Calif., for that top spot, according to realtor.com’s National Housing Trend Report for March. Oakland had occupied the top spot for the fewest days on the market on realtor.com’s report since November 2013.
The national average for days on the market is 102 days, but in some markets, listings are typically on the market for a month or even less.
Realtor.com’s report shows the following 10 metro areas with the lowest median days on the market…
And see where Seattle is on the list!
To cull the list, they began with the 100 most populous Metropolitan Statistical Areas in the U.S., geographic areas designated by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget that include cities and their surrounding suburbs. They rated these places based on six metrics. Using data from Moody’s Analytics, they assessed the estimated rates of population growth for 2013 and 2014, year-over-year job growth for 2013, and the rate of gross metro product growth—a.k.a. the economic growth rate–for 2013. They also considered federal unemployment data and median salaries for local college-educated workers, courtesy of Payscale.com. The result is a list of the 20 fastest growing metro areas in America in terms of population and economy.
See where Seattle lands on the list!
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