Fast-Growing DFW Cities Among the Most Attractive Housing Markets in U.S.

It officially may be fall now, but by least by one measure, the North Texas housing market is 100-degrees-in-the-summer hot.

A recent study by personal finance website WalletHub ranks four North Texas cities among the 10 most attractive real estate markets in the U.S. Frisco grabs the No. 1 spot, with McKinney at No. 4, Denton at No. 5, and Allen at No. 6.

One thing they all have in common: They’re a bit of a drive out of the big cities. By comparison, Fort Worth ranks No. 26, Arlington comes in at No. 86, and Dallas falls well past the century mark, at No. 137.

People love those ‘burbs.

Looking in particular at Frisco, its placement atop the WalletHub ranking stems in large part from its eye-popping population growth. At a rate of 71 percent, Frisco was the fastest-growing large U.S. city from 2010 to 2019, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Today, Frisco’s population exceeds 208,000.

Frisco remains one of the most active cities in DFW in terms of home construction. Through May 31, there were 1,283 residential building permits (not quite as many as nearby Celina).

To determine the most attractive real estate markets, WalletHub compared 300 cities across 18 key metrics. The data ranges from appreciation of median home price to job growth.

The Dallas-Fort Worth real estate market “is doing great after recovering from the blows of the pandemic since July of last year. Demand for single-family homes has risen and supply has lagged since the second half of last year,” according to Norada Real Estate Investments.

Highlighting the hotness of the DFW market, Norada notes that the region’s supply of available homes stood at 1.1 months in the second quarter, and that the median home price climbed 22.4 percent to $349,381.

“2021 has represented a year of strengths in many financial areas. The stock market and bank account balances are up, while unemployment and interest rates are low. These factors represent ideal conditions for the housing market, and as long as we continue to see shortages in housing inventory, we should still see an ideal environment for housing growth,” Job Hammond, secretary-treasurer of the Austin Board of Realtors and an adjunct professor at Austin Community College, tells WalletHub.

The only other Texas market in the top 10 is second-ranked Austin.

Here are the 10 most attractive real estate markets in the country, as judged by WalletHub.

  1. Frisco
  2. Austin
  3. Gilbert, Arizona
  4. McKinney
  5. Denton
  6. Allen
  7. Durham, North Carolina
  8. Reno, Nevada
  9. Roseville, California
  10. Nashville, Tennessee

Source: Fort Worth Culture Map