The housing market has gained $4 trillion in value in the past year as cash-rich Americans have transferred their wealth from major hubs like San Francisco and New York to relatively affordable cities with more space and sunshine. The result is skyrocketing home values—a benefit for homeowners but a barrier for many first-time buyers.
The total value of homes in the U.S. has surged 13.4% ($4 trillion) during the coronavirus pandemic, to $33.4 trillion in February 2021 from $29.4 trillion in February 2020. The increase was driven by Jacksonville, FL, Austin, TX, Charlotte, NC, Phoenix and Sacramento, CA—relatively affordable, sunny destinations that have attracted an influx of wealthy homebuyers from dense, coastal cities.
Housing prices have been soaring across the U.S. over the past year, even as a pandemic-driven recession has left scores of Americans without jobs. Low mortgage rates and a shortage of houses for sale have fueled fierce competition, in turn pushing up home values.
Prices have also jumped because so many people have been able to relocate thanks to remote work. Affluent Americans and major corporations have left San Francisco and New York for less expensive locales like Austin and Charlotte, and they took their wallets with them. As a result, home values in these places have seen an especially sharp increase. This has benefited families that already own homes but pushed homeownership further out of reach for many Americans, exacerbating wealth inequality in the U.S.
Affordable Migration Hotspots See Biggest Market-Value Gains In Percentage Terms
The total value of homes in Jacksonville jumped 21.1% year over year to $165.9 billion in February 2021—the largest gain in percentage terms among the 50 most populous U.S. metropolitan areas. It was followed by Austin (+17.9%), Charlotte (+17.3%), Phoenix (+16.1%) and Sacramento (+14.8%). Rounding out the top 10 were Detroit, Milwaukee, Riverside, CA, Providence, RI and West Palm Beach, FL, all of which experienced market-value increases of more than 12%. Scroll to the bottom of this report for a table breaking down the 50 largest metros.
Four of the top 10 metros—Jacksonville, Charlotte, Detroit and Milwaukee—had a median home price below the national level ($342,326) in January, the most recent month for which sale price data is available.
“A lot of cash buyers are coming to Jacksonville from big cities like L.A. to take advantage of lower taxes, and they’re offering sellers well over their asking prices. They’re discovering that they can afford a nice beach house here, when before they could only buy a modest condo,” said local Redfin real estate agent Heather Kruayai. “Locals are getting outbid because they can’t compete with the out-of-state money and there just aren’t enough homes on the market.”
Kruayai continued: “Sellers are determined to get top-dollar because they know how hot the market is. When they see that a home similar to theirs sold for $480,000, they’ll want to list theirs for $520,000. They’re confident that surging demand will continue to drive up prices.”
Three of the top 10 metros—Austin, Phoenix and Sacramento—have consistently made Redfin’s ranking of the most popular migration destinations during the pandemic. Austin had a bigger net inflow of residents than any other major metro in January, meaning more people looked to move in than leave. Nearly 45% of Redfin.com home searches in Austin came from users in other metro areas in January, up from 32.6% a year earlier.
A recent Redfin analysis found that out-of-towners moving into a handful of the country’s top migration destinations had larger homebuying budgets than locals. The average housing budget for out-of-towners relocating to Austin in 2020 was $852,276, 32.2% higher than the $644,771 average budget for local buyers.
“This is the busiest market I’ve seen in 15 years,” said Austin Redfin agent Andrew Vallejo. “Three-quarters of my clients are coming from the Bay Area, and many of them work for major companies like Google, Facebook, Oracle, Amazon or Tesla, which have all built offices here or are in the process of doing so. “With so much equity in the financial markets, these buyers have a ton of buying power. Sellers and builders are raising prices because they see that these buyers are willing to pay up.”
While the jump in U.S. home values has made homeownership more challenging for many Americans, it correlates with an increase in new businesses across the country. In Texas, for example, business formation was up 66% year over year in January (outpacing national growth of 58%) as many entrepreneurs used their home equity as a source of collateral to secure financing for their businesses.
Housing Market Summary for 50 Most Populous U.S. Metros
All data represents February, unless otherwise noted.
| Metro Area | Year-Over-Year Change In Total Value of Homes (%) | Total Value of Homes (Billions of $) | Year-Over-Year Change In Total Value of Homes (Billions of $) | Median Sale Price (January 2021) | Year-Over-Year Change in Median Sale Price (%) (January 2021) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jacksonville, FL | 21.1% | $165.9 | $28.9 | $270,477 | 9.7% |
| Austin, TX | 17.9% | $295.2 | $44.7 | $401,756 | 22.3% |
| Charlotte, NC | 17.3% | $308.0 | $45.5 | $308,959 | 11.7% |
| Phoenix, AZ | 16.1% | $644.1 | $89.1 | $353,560 | 17.6% |
| Sacramento, CA | 14.8% | $379.2 | $48.7 | $499,557 | 16.3% |
| Detroit, MI | 13.4% | $106.6 | $12.6 | $165,609 | 15.3% |
| Milwaukee, WI | 13.2% | $130.4 | $15.2 | $260,735 | 12.1% |
| Riverside, CA | 12.8% | $580.9 | $66.1 | $464,573 | 18.8% |
| Providence, RI | 12.8% | $212.4 | $24.1 | $343,628 | 15.0% |
| West Palm Beach, FL | 12.7% | $295.3 | $33.3 | $359,969 | 23.1% |
| Seattle, WA | 12.7% | $730.7 | $82.2 | $677,642 | 14.6% |
| Tampa, FL | 12.5% | $324.3 | $36.1 | $282,910 | 15.5% |
| Nashville, TN | 12.1% | $243.1 | $26.2 | $346,370 | 12.4% |
| Orlando, FL | 11.7% | $259.8 | $27.2 | $301,241 | 12.3% |
| Nassau County, NY | 11.7% | $621.6 | $64.9 | $552,683 | 18.0% |
| Warren, MI | 11.6% | $264.8 | $27.5 | $243,091 | 7.8% |
| Atlanta, GA | 11.6% | $674.9 | $70.0 | $296,458 | 14.3% |
| Indianapolis, IN | 11.5% | $159.4 | $16.4 | $228,585 | 12.5% |
| San Diego, CA | 11.1% | $694.1 | $69.6 | $697,106 | 14.2% |
| Fort Worth, TX | 11.1% | $209.1 | $20.8 | $288,754 | 16.0% |
| Pittsburgh, PA | 11.0% | $162.4 | $16.1 | $221,123 | 24.4% |
| Columbus, OH | 11.0% | $172.4 | $17.0 | $250,741 | 9.2% |
| Virginia Beach, VA | 10.7% | $149.7 | $14.5 | $269,326 | 9.3% |
| Cleveland, OH | 10.5% | $153.5 | $14.6 | $172,757 | 7.1% |
| Denver, CO | 10.5% | $487.7 | $46.2 | $474,239 | 10.1% |
| Dallas, TX | 10.2% | $487.2 | $45.1 | $338,861 | 14.2% |
| New Brunswick, NJ | 10.2% | $409.5 | $37.8 | $392,582 | 16.5% |
| Oakland, CA | 10.1% | $749.2 | $69.0 | $866,543 | 16.8% |
| Anaheim, CA | 10.0% | $798.6 | $72.6 | $840,907 | 10.8% |
| Baltimore, MD | 9.9% | $342.9 | $31.0 | $325,484 | 11.3% |
| Philadelphia, PA | 9.7% | $206.9 | $18.3 | $252,469 | 9.4% |
| Portland, OR | 9.7% | $379.8 | $33.5 | $475,481 | 14.8% |
| Montgomery County, PA | 9.7% | $288.3 | $25.4 | $371,635 | 11.5% |
| Houston, TX | 9.5% | $586.1 | $50.7 | $280,333 | 11.3% |
| Washington, D.C. | 9.2% | $883.4 | $74.5 | $460,075 | 6.7% |
| Kansas City, MO | 9.2% | $172.0 | $14.5 | $259,830 | 11.5% |
| Cincinnati, OH | 9.0% | $172.8 | $14.3 | $227,022 | 19.3% |
| St. Louis, MO | 9.0% | $212.1 | $17.5 | $218,683 | 17.4% |
| Miami, FL | 8.9% | $425.9 | $34.9 | $378,071 | 17.4% |
| Newark, NJ | 8.9% | $276.2 | $22.6 | $449,840 | 17.4% |
| Fort Lauderdale, FL | 8.8% | $261.4 | $21.0 | $324,551 | 14.5% |
| Las Vegas, NV | 8.6% | $252.9 | $20.0 | $332,572 | 11.8% |
| Boston, MA | 8.2% | $965.7 | $73.4 | $577,158 | 10.4% |
| Minneapolis, MN | 8.2% | $426.7 | $32.2 | $322,293 | 10.9% |
| San Jose, CA | 7.6% | $703.0 | $49.8 | $1,238,966 | 7.2% |
| Los Angeles, CA | 7.5% | $2040.7 | $143.1 | $749,302 | 15.5% |
| San Antonio, TX | 5.3% | $194.8 | $9.9 | $268,085 | 11.7% |
| Chicago, IL | 4.9% | $777.6 | $36.6 | $285,336 | 11.9% |
| San Francisco, CA | 1.4% | $670.5 | $9.3 | $1,416,806 | 0.3% |
| New York, NY | N/A* | $2,002.6 | N/A* | $591,170 | 2.5% |
Methodology
To determine how much property value American homeowners have gained during the coronavirus pandemic, we calculated the aggregate value of about 80 million U.S. homes using Redfin Estimates of the homes’ market values.
*We exclude year-over-year comparisons for New York, NY from the table above because more property data recently became available for that metro, meaning the data is not comparable to past years.
United States
Canada