Mapped: Where Real Estate Prices are Rising the Fastest
The real estate market is a location game.
While forces like interest rates, demographics, and the economy help drive the housing market as a whole, the strength of your local market depends on other factors closer to home.
When you zoom out to look at U.S. real estate from a bird’s eye view, you’ll see this regional variance in full effect. Some markets are booming while others are tanking, and the contrast between the winners and losers is a stark one.
Real Estate Booms
Today’s infographic comes from TitleMax, and it shows where real estate prices are appreciating and depreciating the fastest.
We’ll start on the high end: here are the 10 cities that have seen the highest absolute growth in terms of price per square foot over the last five years.
| Rank | City | State | Price change (per sq. ft) |
|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Beverly Hills | CA | +$764.43 |
| #2 | Fisher Island | FL | +$493.16 |
| #3 | Mountain View | CA | +$452.67 |
| #4 | San Carlos | CA | +$419.87 |
| #5 | Cupertino | CA | +$418.44 |
| #6 | Sunnyvale | CA | +$408.66 |
| #7 | San Francisco | CA | +$381.16 |
| #8 | San Mateo | CA | +$370.61 |
| #9 | Santa Monica | CA | +$364.48 |
| #10 | Manhattan Beach | CA | +$363.11 |
Median home price change over 5-years, measured in price per sq. ft (Source: Zillow)
The only non-California locale to make it onto the list is Fisher Island in Miami, Florida, which is home to just 467 residents including Andre Agassi, Oprah Winfrey, and Robert Herjavec.
While these are absolute increases, it’s worth noting that they are still very significant in relative terms. For example, although it’s true that Beverley Hills is the most expensive housing market in the U.S., prices have risen 47% over the last five years.
Real Estate Busts
Things may be rosy in the Golden State, but there are also places spread throughout the country where prices are dropping fast.
Many of these are smaller, lesser-known locales – and while they are located all over the map, eight of them are in states along the Eastern Seaboard.
| Rank | City | State | Price change (per sq. ft) |
|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Sunset | SC | -$64.31 |
| #2 | Sharon | CT | -$63.21 |
| #3 | Lake Toxaway | NC | -$56.32 |
| #4 | Atlantic City | NJ | -$54.16 |
| #5 | Somers Point | NJ | -$43.99 |
| #6 | Ticonderoga | NY | -$39.64 |
| #7 | Hamburg | NJ | -$38.11 |
| #8 | Glenbrook | NV | -$34.36 |
| #9 | Winsted | CT | -$34.23 |
| #10 | Mercer | WI | -$31.69 |
Median home price change over 5-years, measured in price per sq. ft (Source: Zillow)
A Stark Contrast
If you sold a 1,000 sq. ft condo in Beverley Hills – the country’s most expensive real estate market – it would likely net you about $1.6 million.
What could you buy for that in Tamaqua, PA, the country’s cheapest?
In theory, you could pick up roughly 71,000 sq. ft of real estate – that’s about 10 mansions worth, or just short of the size of an average Walmart.
