The Starter Home in the DC Area Continues to Disappear

• June 21st 2016

by Nena Perry-Brown

A report out earlier this year revealed that the number of “starter” homes in the DC area dropped a whopping 40 percent since 2012 as home prices increased in the region. Now, a new version of the report reveals that this type of home continues to disappear.

Trulia examined how starter home inventory nationwide has changed from the second quarter of 2015 through the second quarter of 2016, and found that this property segment has continued to decrease as a share of the housing market in the DC area, dropping from 27.7 percent of the market to 23.3 percent. By contrast, 46.9 percent of DC-area listings for sale are in the “premium home” price bracket.

In order to determine what homes are classified as “starter”, Trulia estimated the value of the total housing stock for sale in the area and divided those values into thirds, with the highest segment being “premium” homes, the middle third “trade-up” homes, and the bottom third “starter” homes. This is how the Trulia definition of a “starter” home — priced up to $282,139 — is more relevant for the DC area than DC proper. While Trulia’s analysis is of the DC metro area at large, a homebuyer would have quite a time finding a home in this price range in DC proper.

Nationwide, as demand for starter homes has dropped in many areas, the decreasing share of starter homes on the market has not always translated to higher prices. However, this is not the case in the DC area, where the median price of starter homes has increased 7 percent to $209,963.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/starter_homes_dwindle_dc_area/11382.