You don’t have to be an octogenarian to recall the days when renovated bungalows in, say, the Old Fourth Ward were selling squarely in the $200,000s.
Today? Yeah right.
It’s no secret that basically everything, everywhere has gotten more expensive lately, from cars to coffee to condos. But is Atlanta letting one of its chief selling points—a relatively low cost-of-living, all things considered—slip away at a disproportionately fast rate?
Recent indicators point to “appears so.”
MakeMyMove, an online relocation marketplace, recently analyzed 30,000 relocation applications and more than 700 confirmed moves in the U.S. One key takeaway: Many households with college degrees and stable jobs earning between $100,000 and $150,000 annually are uprooting from major metros to smaller cities and nearby communities where “housing supply and prices better align with incomes… reopening a viable path to ownership and long-term stability,” per analysts.
Among the “high-cost metro areas” where mover patterns show consistent exits are Chicago in the Midwest and Atlanta in the South. The Big Peach, in fact, ranked No. 2 for “cities where costs outpace lifestyle returns,” per the findings.
“New national data shows many middle-income households priced out of homeownership in the Atlanta area are relocating to smaller Georgia communities where housing access and long-term stability are still attainable,” reads a summary. (Zip codes for both Rome and LaGrange, each roughly an hour from downtown Atlanta without traffic, ranked in the top 10 of relocation destinations.)
Meanwhile, on the renting front, “rent inflation” in U.S. markets continues to outpace overall price growth, including in the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell metro area, according to researchers at Construction Coverage, which tracks housing trends.
Across metro Atlanta, the median monthly rent has climbed to $2,105—or 9.4 percent higher than the national median. Median rents for one-bedroom apartments have ticked up to $1,806, and for two-bedroom rentals $1,981, per that analysis.
Which means it’s high time for a reader poll regarding the state of overall Atlanta affordability right now, all things considered, as a new year quickly unfolds.
Please take a second to cast a vote below:
