These lesser-known towns saw home prices increase the most last year
As the most coveted towns finally peak, demand is spilling over into their sometimes overlooked neighbors.
Years of home price increases in some of the Boston area’s most exclusive suburbs are now pushing up real estate values in some of their more humble neighbors, new stats show.
As prices max out in highly affluent communities like Wellesley and Winchester, buyers are taking a second look at neighboring towns with less cachet but more reasonable prices.
Towns like Natick and Wayland and even Needham in the western suburbs, Medford and Arlington in the inner suburbs, and Norwell on the South Shore are seeing prices rise as buyers broaden their search, according to numbers from Boston-based real estate publisher and data firm, The Warren Group.
“The prices in the most desirable towns have gone up so much that people are considering neighboring towns,’’ noted Coldwell Banker broker Norman Holbrook, who works out of the firm’s Westwood office.
Natick, Wayland and Needham all saw significant price increases in 2015, Warren Group stats through the end of November show.
Wayland saw the biggest jump, with its media hitting $700,000 towards the end of 2015 after a 12 percent increase. Sales were up 32 percent.
Natick saw an 11 percent jump to $528,000, while Needham’s median home price rose a 4.3 percent in 2015, to $840,000.
All three western suburbs are benefiting from sky-high prices in exclusive suburbs like Weston, Wellesley, Lexington and Concord, which all saw either price declines last year, or, in the case of Wellesley, a small increase.
Needham in particular has been an increasingly attractive alternative to buyers priced out of Wellesley, who find they can get the same sized house for 20 percent less, along with a bigger yard, notes Elaine Bannigan, broker owner of Pinnacle Residential Properties.
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Out on I-495, upscale suburbs Southborough and Harvard saw prices stall out last year. A favorite among well-paid techies, Southborough saw its median price plunge 9.7 percent, to $540,000, its first decline since 2010, Warren Group numbers show.
By contrast, its more modest neighbor, Marlborough, saw its median rise 5.7 percent, to $328,000.
Harvard, another wealthy outer suburb, eked out a 1.2 percent gain, to $550,000. Compare that to its work-a-day neighbor Ayer, where the median price shot up more than 11 percent, to $319,900.
On the South Shore, Cohasset saw a 2.8 percent drop, to $743,500, compared to neighboring Norwell’s 8.3 percent gain, which pushed its median to $551,000.
And to the north of Boston, Winchester saw prices go up a measly $5,000, to $910,000, compared to a 7 percent jump in Medford, which brought its median price up to $450,500.
“Relatively less expensive towns have been gaining ground on their more expensive neighbors,’’ Coldwell Banker’s Holbrook wrote in a recent piece for MarketWatch. “This trend has led to a dramatic price appreciation of these relatively lower priced communities.’’
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