Market Stats:
No. 12: Best City to Invest in Housing in 2015 – Forbes
No. 5: Healthiest Economic Market in the U.S. – Metrostudy
55.5%: Increase in New-Home Sales from 2011 to 2013 – Metrostudy
No. 1: Metro for upward mobility – Harvard
Salt Lake City
In most areas, millennials can likely find either great job opportunities or affordable housing—not both.
But Salt Lake City is an anomaly in that equation. Young job seekers have flocked to this city, where odds of upward mobility were ranked No. 1 among larger metros like Boston, New York, and San Francisco, according to a study conducted by Harvard and UC-Berkeley economists.
And with 50% of homes being affordable for the metropolitan’s millennial average income of $50,000, according to Trulia, these transplants aren’t leaving. In fact, Salt Lake City’s millennial population is 16.8% of its total population, putting this city in the top 12 metropolitan statistical areas for largest portions of millennial populations.
However, soaring home prices have caused several economists to put this booming metro on the bubble-watch list. The median price for a new single-family home in Salt Lake City increased 9% to $330,900 between 2013 and 2014. Dave Robison, president of the Salt Lake City Board of Realtors, suspects prices will continue increasing over the next couple of years, but likely at a much slower rate.
Still, expected home price increases will likely be sustained by Salt Lake City’s median household income of $61,941 and the growing population. “Our population really keeps growing more than our housing supply provides for,” says Robison.
And there’s definitely a sustained interest in new homes: Salt Lake City experienced a 55.5% jump in new-home sales from 1,648 in 2011 to 2,563 in 2013.
The largest concern for builders in this area is an impending labor shortage. An Associated General Contractors of America survey released in January 2015 revealed that although roughly 70% of general contractors in Utah expect to expand payrolls this year, 85% expect to have difficulties in finding and hiring building professionals.
However, Salt Lake City is still ripe for new builders since the area hasn’t been saturated by large production builders: only four of the top 10 builders in the city are listed on the BUILDER Top 100. — Kayla Devon
