Boston metro area home values are up, while inventory is way down
We already know property values are pretty high in the Boston metro area. But just how high have they gotten in the past year?
We already know property values are pretty high in the Boston metro area. But just how high have they gotten in the past year?
A new Zillow report examined how property values across the United States have changed since last October, finding that home values rose 6.2 percent nationally. The current Zillow Home Value Index, aka the median home value, is $191,200 nationwide, up from $180,000 in 2015. This is the 51st straight month of annual home value gains nationally, according to Zillow.
Boston saw a comparable increase in the last year, as property values rose 6 percent, bringing the current median home value in the area to $405,200 from $382,000 at the same time last year.
To get these new numbers, Zillow looked at public records from 928 metropolitan and micropolitan areas in the country between October 2015 and October 2016. To calculate the Zillow Home Value Index, Zillow included the values of all single-family residences, condominiums, and cooperatives from those public records.
“The housing market has been favoring sellers for the past few years,” Zillow Chief Economist Svenja Gudell said in a statement. “Sellers in the current housing landscape often have the luxury of listing their home ‘as-is’ without fixing it up or with only minimal window-dressing since demand for homes has been high and inventory low.”
This is the 21st consecutive month of annual inventory declines, according to Zillow.
And inventory in Boston is at one of the lowest rates in the country. In fact, Boston had the largest inventory drop of the 35 largest U.S. metro areas. Nationally, there are 5.7 percent fewer homes for sale now than there were last year at this time. In Boston, there are 25.8 percent fewer homes for sale than a year ago.
Gudell said in the statement that she hopes the market will eventually shift to favor buyers.
“It’s common for sellers to receive multiple bids, and in the hottest markets, sell for over asking price, but these conditions will change in the future,” Gudell said in the statement. “As the number of homes for sale increases and home value appreciation slows, we expect the market to meaningfully swing in favor of buyers within the next two to three years.”
Rent prices are also up. Nationally, rents only rose 1.4 percent over the past year, to $1,402 per month from $1,382. However, in the Boston metro area, the median rent price rose 3.3 percent to $2,312 per month, up from $2,239.
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