Let us first express that although we are completely biased about Texas (we’re headquartered here, I personally grew up here), the data is not – Texas is the best. That’s a scientific fact. There’s a running joke in Austin that if there is a list of “best places to [anything],” we’re on it, and the joke causes eye rolls instead of humility (we’re sore winners and sore losers in this town).
That said, SelfStorage.com dug into the data and determined that the top 12 places to buy a home are currently Texas and North Carolina (and Portland, I guess you’re okay too or whatever).
They examined the nerdiest of numbers from the compound annual growth rate in inflation-adjusted GDP to cost premium, affordability, taxes, job growth, and housing availability.
“Buying a house is a big decision and a big commitment,” the company notes. “Although U.S. home prices have risen in the long term, the last decade has shown that path is sometimes full of twists, turns, dizzying heights and steep, abrupt falls. Today, home prices are stabilizing and increasing in most areas of the U.S.”
According to the National Association of Realtors (NAR), the median value of a single-family home rose 6.0 percent from the final quarter of 2013 to the last quarter of 2014, but SelfStorage.com acknowledges that “home prices aren’t the only factor in selecting a place to buy. Economic and job growth matter, too, as do availability and affordability of housing. And don’t forget real estate taxes,” so for the 60 biggest metro areas in the U.S., they examined these and other factors.
The top 12 places to buy a home in America
The study indicates that the biggest metro areas in Texas dominate the list, and a handful of other states join the list as well, with Austin taking the cake:
- Austin, TX
- Houston, TX
- Raleigh, NC
- Las Vegas, NV
- San Antonio, TX
- Dallas, TX
- Charlotte, NC
- Orlando, FL
- Atlanta, GA
- Phoenix, AZ
- Portland, OR
- Salt Lake, UT
Is your city on the list? Should it be? What do you think of the overall list?
Lani is the COO and News Director at The American Genius, has co-authored a book, co-founded BASHH, Austin Digital Jobs, Remote Digital Jobs, and is a seasoned business writer and editorialist with a penchant for the irreverent.
