Home Prices Are Soaring in This City You’ve Never Heard Of

As many housing markets across the nation slide into a deep freeze, a few places are just starting to heat up, according to the National Association of Realtors’ latest quarterly report.

Home prices were up in 90% of U.S. metro areas in the NAR survey during the fourth quarter of 2022, although growth appears to be slowing.

In a summary of the findings, Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, says:

“A slowdown in home prices is underway and welcomed, particularly as the typical home price has risen 42% in the past three years. Far fewer metro markets experienced double-digit price gains in the latest quarter.”

But despite this cooldown, a handful of housing markets have turned red-hot. Following are some places where home prices now are soaring — the first of which you might not have even heard of despite home prices skyrocketing more than 20% there.

1. Farmington, New Mexico

Year-over-year price increase for existing single-family homes in this metro during the fourth quarter: 20.3%

In New Mexico, the cities of Albuquerque and Santa Fe steal all the headlines. In fact, there is a good chance you have never heard of Farmington.

But this town in the northwest corner of the state leads the nation in home price growth. Farmington is actually known as the commercial heartbeat of the Four Corners region, where the states of New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah all come together.

2. North Port-Sarasota-Bradenton, Florida

Year-over-year price increase for existing single-family homes in this metro during the fourth quarter: 19.5%

Hurricane Ian inflicted some serious damage on the city of North Port in 2022, but it couldn’t knock down the region’s flourishing housing market.

3. Naples-Immokalee-Marco Island, Florida

Year-over-year price increase for existing single-family homes in this metro during the fourth quarter: 17.2%

Hurricane Ian also directed some of its fury at Naples, which saw historic flooding. But as with its neighbor to the north, this metro area’s housing activity was not slowed by Ian.

The rest of the top 10

Here are more metro areas where home prices have jumped year over year:

• Greensboro-High Point, North Carolina: 17%
• Myrtle Beach-Conway-North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina-North Carolina: 16.2%
• Oshkosh-Neenah, Wisconsin: 16%
• Winston-Salem, North Carolina: 15.7%
• El Paso, Texas: 15.2%
• Punta Gorda, Florida: 15.2%
• Deltona-Daytona Beach-Ormond Beach, Florida: 14.5%

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