Tom Kalinski, RE/MAX of Boulder
BOULDER – When it comes to stable growth in single-family home real estate, Boulder and Colorado are crushing it.
Three of the top 10 most stable housing markets for growth and stability in the U.S. are in Colorado, according to the 2016 SmartAsset study of single-family home data.
Boulder came out way ahead (37 percentage points) of the closest contender in the analysis, ranking for the second year in a row as the No. 1 housing market of the 358 largest urban markets in the U.S.
Boulder’s overall growth rate is 308 percent since 1991. Since 1990, home prices have grown an average of four percent per year and are approaching a price level that has nearly quadrupled.
Even more important to many homeowners, the study shows the odds in Boulder of a five percent loss in home price are zero percent.
The odds are based on last year’s analysis showing that the average homeowner in Boulder hasn’t suffered any significant price declines in the last 25 years. The 2016 study revealed that the Boulder metro area has the highest average home appreciation of any U.S. city. This is the second year for the SmartAsset study.
The No. 2 metro area, Austin-Round Rock, TX, has grown 271 percent overall since 1991. Like Boulder, this metro area has a zero percent chance of losing five percent in home price.
Rounding out the Colorado contingent are No. 6 ranked Fort Collins with 246 percent overall growth since 1991 and No. 9 ranked Denver-Aurora-Lakewood with 270 percent overall growth in the same time period. Both of these metros are new to the SmartAsset top 10 list.
Home price growth in the Fort Collins metro area has been fairly steady. On average, homeowners had a five percent chance of seeing their home values decline by five percent if they bought homes at any point in the last 25 years.
While the Denver-Aurora-Lakewood metro area has seen a 270 percent total growth rate, home prices have also dropped significantly at times during that period, increasing the odds of losing more than five percent in home price to 17 percent.
The West is leading the rest of the U.S. in stable and growing housing markets. Six Western metro areas made the top 10, with three of those showing no significant price declines since 1991. Last year, five of the housing markets with the most stable growth were located in the West.
Rising home values allow homeowners to build equity in their homes. But stable growth is generally considered to be better than a rapid rise in prices followed by a decline, says the SmartAsset report.
SmartAsset calculated the most stable growth based on the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s home price index for single-family homes in the 358 largest urban markets. The study focused on homebuyers who had purchased homes at any point between the first quarter of 1991 and the first quarter of 2016.
Two factors were analyzed: the overall home price growth rate since 1991 (growth factor) and the average odds that a homeowner in a particular market would have experienced significant price declines within the decade after buying a home (stability factor). In order for a price decline to be significant, home prices in any quarter within 10 years had to fall by at least five percent relative to the original home price.
See the full study at https://smartasset.com/mortgage/the-best-housing-markets-for-growth-and-stability-2016.
By: Tom Kalinski, RE/MAX of Boulder. Call 303.441.5620 or e-mail [email protected].
