Millennials Taking Over Boston, Making it a Hot Housing Market

People have different reasons for wanting to buy a home in a certain city or town, or even as specific as a community or a neighborhood.

Maybe they want to live close to where they work, so they can have a short commute. Maybe they want to live nearby family and friends. Maybe it has to do with schools for their kids or for those without children, maybe the attraction of entertainment and lifestyle plays a part.

Or maybe folks just want to find somewhere affordable.

Whatever the reason, finding the right place to live is important for a would-be homeowner, but it’s also not the easiest task.

Home prices and mortgage rates are expected to rise this year and the available housing supply within a buyer’s parameters may shrink.

But some markets are better than others. Realtor.com recently released their hottest markets list for 2019.

Boston, despite its high home prices, is still trending and ranks No. 10 on the 2019 list.

Economists for the website continuously track home prices, availability and how quickly homes will sell. To make this list, they combine that data with markets that are hotbeds for job growth, are experiencing an influx of new construction and are flush with millennials – the generation making up a majority of buyers in the U.S.

Millennials who want to establish themselves in the Northeast corridor of the country are landing in Boston in droves.

According to data from the National Association of REALTORS®, millennials are expected to take over 40 percent of all of Boston’s mortgages in 2019.

While that percentage may be surprising, what shouldn’t be is that Boston is an attractive location for younger homebuyers.

Boston has one of the most walkable downtown areas in the U.S. replete with historical locations – Boston Common, Faneuil Hall, Beacon Hill and the Freedom Trail are among the popular locations to find people on a daily basis.

Not to mention, Boston is easily the most intellectually rich town in the country, boasting many top colleges. Whether it’s Boston College, Boston University, Harvard, or the Massachusetts Institution of Technology, academia abounds.

There are few cities that can rival the passion that exists for Boston sports, as it is one of only six cities in the country that has a team in each of the four major professional sports that play within its city limits.

Entertainment venues abound in Boston with a variety of live music and a thriving theatre district and when it comes to dining, it’s hard to top the city’s North End for a high-end meal.

All of this and more is why millennials are willing to invest in homes with a forecasted median price of $496,710.

Rounding out the Top 10 list of housing markets in 2019 are Lakeland, Fla. (No. 1) Grand Rapids, Mich. (No.2), El Paso, Texas (No. 3), Chatanooga, Tenn. (No. 4), Phoenix, Ariz. (No. 5), Bridgeport, Conn. (No. 6), Las Vegas, Nev. (No. 7), Boise, Idaho (No.8) and Miami, Fla. (No. 9).