Miami Moves into the Top Tier of Most Valuable Housing Metros
Since the pandemic, it has risen in housing value, along with several other Florida cities.
Welcome to the club, Miami. The South Florida city has joined four traditional valuable housing metros in the category of top five most valuable, moving up from ninth place, according to a report from Zillow. Miami, land of beaches, cruise ships, Art Deco architecture and design and lively music and food scenes, gained housing value of 86.6%.
Miami jumped from its former ninth place in May 2020, during the pandemic, to beat out Washington, D.C., to claim its berth in the top five nationally. The four other cities with which it shares this top star billing have enjoyed the limelight for the last five years. They include New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Boston.
Altogether, the total value of the U.S. housing market is 49% higher than before the pandemic, hitting $52 trillion, after surging over the last year. It had what the report calls a hiccup from July 2022 to January 2023 due to higher mortgage rates spurring a decline as buyers waited and residential investment fell. But then it picked up this year with total value moving forward by more than $2.6 trillion in the last year.
Most of the uptick has been due to new construction becoming available this past spring and summer. New home sales are expected to account for a big part of demand as many in existing homes stay put since many don’t know where to go to find housing inventory and don’t want to give up low mortgage rates if they can’t buy with all cash.
As this home-value boom continues, three other Florida markets, besides Miami, have gained housing value over this period: Tampa saw its value rise 88.9%, Jacksonville went up 82.4% and Orlando climbed 72.3%. Together, with Miami, Florida has become the state with the second most valuable housing market, surpassing New York but trailing California. The reason for Florida’s strong new construction numbers are said to be its large population growth and increased competition for existing homes.
California has also seen values rise with more than $10 trillion of value in its housing market, which represents one-fifth of the national total. Florida, New York, Texas and New Jersey complete the list of the top five states in this category. Massachusetts, which had the fifth most valuable housing market before the pandemic, now ranks sixth, ahead of Washington, D.C., which dropped to seventh place from fifth.
Another trend worth noting is that builders focused on higher density homes when possible to cope with increased costs and bring more housing to the market