The DC Flipping Market: Fewer Flips But Healthy Profits

• September 15, 2016

by Nena Perry-Brown

A flipped home for sale on 12th Place NW.

DC has held a strong reputation as a popular place for investors to swoop in and flip houses for several years now, but that wave seems to have started ebbing.

ATTOM Data Solutions has released its second quarter home flipping report, which shows that nationwide, home flips are at their highest level in six years. However, in DC proper, the number of home flips has dropped 14 percent since the second quarter of 2015 and by 17 percent since the first quarter of 2016.

Home flippers in DC reportedly enjoyed an average gross profit of $209,750 in the second quarter of the year — a nearly 75 percent return on investment (ROI). While this is noteworthy, the figure does not take into account the costs associated with renovations, so the net profit figure is likely much lower.

Excluding zip codes where the low number of flips could skew the data, the three most profitable areas to flips houses in DC are both in Northeast. First is the 20017 zip code, with investors making a gross profit of $364,000 and a 116 percent ROI in neighborhoods like Brookland, Edgewood and Michigan Park.

The next most-profitable zip code is 20002, which encompasses sections of Capitol Hill, Edgewood, Eckington, and Trinidad. Flippers here enjoy gross profits of $349,999 and an ROI of 108 percent.

The zip code that includes Petworth and 16th Street Heights is the fourth most-profitable zip code, and 20020 rounds out the top five, with flippers in Woodland and Anacostia making one of the city’s healthiest ROIs at 133 percent with gross profits of $212,500.

This study identifies a home flip as having taken place when a property is sold twice within a year based on publicly-recorded sales data.

This article originally published at http://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/the_dc_flipping_market_fewer_flips_but_healthy_profits/11683