July 22, 2017
AVENIR on Fifteenth/www.avenirphilly.com
Center City micro-apartment complex AVENIR.
Get 'em cheap while you can.
A recent report released by Fitch Ratings, an international credit rating agency, considered Philadelphia's housing prices the third-most undervalued across the largest metropolitan areas in the country.
The list is based on the year-over-year change in nominal income growth, population growth, unemployment, change in rental prices and change in home prices for the 50 largest metropolitan statistical areas – bureaucratic speak for a city and its suburbs – in the country, according to Forbes.com, which first reported the ratings.
Only Detroit and New York were rated ahead of Philly, with Chicago and Cincinnati rounding out the top five.
But buyers, particularly millennials, apparently caught on to Philly's relative affordability.
A recent study found that the city needs 38,000 new apartments by 2030 to accommodate demand. That same study stated that 4.6 million new apartments will be needed by then nationwide.
What's more, other research released by Drexel University's Lindy Institute for Urban Innovation found that the city's housing prices are skyrocketing, despite its Fitch rating.
Prices have jumped nearly 15 percent in the last three months, hitting $158,000, and the average house prices grew 13.2 percent to $198,150 during that same period.
Those findings coincided with another facet to the report that stated the number of houses on Philly's market has reached an all-time low.
