San Antonio is among the top 10 U.S. housing markets.
It seemed bound to happen. Inevitable, really. With San Antonio's charm and history, culture and size, it was only a matter of time before the rest of the nation "discovered" the Alamo City. First it was Realtor predicting San Antonio's real estate market was on track to grow faster than both Austin and Houston. Then it was Redfin, which declared three local neighborhoods among the "hottest" for 2022. Now it is Zillow, which named San Antonio among the top 10 hottest housing markets of the year.
To determine the rankings, Zillow analyzed the 50 largest U.S. metro areas to forecast the most competitive housing markets of 2022 using some of the following analysis points:
expected home value appreciation from November 2021 to November 2022
anticipated change in home value appreciation from 2021 flow of for-sale inventory
estimate of the net new number of home-owning households based on current demographic trends new jobs per new housing unit permitted
San Antonio came in at No. 4, along with other cities concentrated mainly in what Zillow dubs "the Sun Belt." The real estate company notes San Antonio's job growth among the key factors driving its housing market.
That job growth is especially impressive when considering we're still amid a pandemic. Over the past year, San Antonio has added nearly 49,000 jobs, according to a December 17 report by the Express-News. And, those gigs are more likely to pay in the six figures. As the Express-News reported last week, San Antonio-New Braunfels is among the areas that saw the most growth in high-paying jobs between 2015 and 2020.
Rounding out the top 5 on Zillow's hot list is Tampa, which is considered the nation's "hottest" housing market at No. 1; Jacksonville, Florida (2); Raleigh, North Carolina (3); and Charlotte, North Carolina (5).
The only other Texas city on the list is Austin at No. 10, a dramatic drop from last year when Zillow crowned it the hottest housing market in the nation. (They weren't wrong; Austin-Round Rock's median home price in November 2021 was $470,000, a 29 percent increase over the year before, according to the Austin Board of Realtors.)
"Baby Boomers and millennials represent two enormous generations, both very active in the housing market," writes Zillow in its report. "Boomers are hardly exiting the market as they age, staying active and purchasing homes in the Sun Belt as they retire and/or move to be closer to grandchildren etc. And millennials are just beginning to age into their prime home buying years as they hit their early-mid thirties."
A "sustained underlying demand" for housing is something Zillow predicts will continue through the '20s as younger millennials age into their homebuying years and Boomers continue to retire and relocate. There is one key factor that may cause these trends to shift a bit, however. Mortgage interest rates were slashed during the pandemic — one of the reasons for the recent housing boom — but they are expected to rise again in 2022.
No matter what, Zillow says buyers should expect home prices to continue to rise, even in cities like San Jose, New York, and San Francisco, where the market is slowing down. The reason? Inventory.
"Inventory of available housing has been limited, as builders play catch-up after years of underbuilding and sellers list their homes in fewer numbers," Zillow says in the report. "None of those trends is expected to change much in 2022 from 2021, and limited housing supply coupled with sky-high housing demand is a classic Econ 101 recipe for rising home values."
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Written By jgbowmanteam.comKatie Friel
Katie covers travel, culture, breaking news, and the occasional sports hot take. She can be found @katiefriel.