Columbus Ranked #4 Hottest Real Estate Market in the Nation

This past April, Realtor.com® put Columbus at number 4 on their list of hottest markets. That’s right behind San Francisco, California! These rankings are based on the number of hits each home listing received and how quickly the homes were selling in cities around the U.S.

From March to April, Columbus jumped up 5 spots—from a rank of 9 in March—and continues to hold steady at number 4 for the month of May. This is the highest ranking the city has ever held since realtor.com® started tracking in 2013.

According to Columbus REALTORS®, central Ohio’s real estate market is seeing increases in nearly every category they track. 9.1% more homes and condos were listed in April this year than in March and 3.6% more than in April of 2017. From March to April of 2018, 10.5% more homes and condos were for sale in central Ohio in the month of April, showing an upward trend for this year. Listings and sales typically increase heading into and throughout the spring season which likely explains the upward trend from March to April. The decrease in the number of listings from last year to this past April may be that those living in the most desirable areas of central Ohio—Upper Arlington, Grandview, and Bexley, to name a few—don’t want to part with their homes and fewer permits for new builds are being given out each year. It is also getting more and more expensive to build a new home thanks to the rising costs of land and regulations. With fewer homes being built in central Ohio, it makes sense that there would be fewer listings and that the listings that are out there are selling for more and more money.

This report also says the average sales price of a central Ohio home from January to April of this year was up 7.3% from April 2017, the average sales price being $216,784. The median sales price was also up—7.9% from the same month last year—coming in at $182,350. Additionally, the percentage of central Ohio sellers receiving their original asking price increased from 97.3% to 98.5% from March to April and increased from 96.4% to 97.2% year over year. As more millennials enter the housing market with better-paying jobs, this trend of increasing sales prices is likely to continue which is good news for sellers, but not so great news for buyers. The increased presence of millennials in the market may also be causing the faster turnaround for listings as well.

According to this report, homes spent an average of 33 days on the market in April which is down nearly 20 percent from April of last year. This is a trend that continues through May, according to realtor.com®, with a median of 31 days on the market—24 days faster than the U.S. overall. It is typical for a hot market to see much faster sales than the national average, realtor.com® says, but the drastic increase in speed over the last year may also have to do with the increasing presence of millennials in the housing market. Millennials are a tech-savvy generation and do much of their shopping online due to its speed and convenience. Consequently, speed and convenience are traits they now expect to see in the rest of their buying experiences, including buying a home. The increased speed of home sales may also reflect the larger trend of increasing reliance on technology by much of the world’s population for advertising, buying, and selling.

With Columbus and central Ohio’s housing market on the rise, agents and their clients will need to be prepared to make some changes in their buying and selling process. First, and foremost, buyers and sellers alike will need to be prepared to move quickly. Sellers will need to be prepared to move out on a much faster timeline than in years previous, and buyers will to make up their minds and make offers much faster to ensure that someone else doesn’t beat them to it. The rising sales prices for homes and condos will also lead to some changes, particularly for buyers. While an increase in sales prices and more and more people receiving their original asking price is great news for someone looking to sell, this means that a buyer may have to consider making an offer above the asking price to ensure they are able to purchase their dream home. Agents will also need to be quick on their feet in order to meet their clients buying and selling needs in this new housing climate.