Your Way Home – December
According to an online house price estimator and economic model from the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), a third full bathroom is the one feature that can have the greatest impact on the value of a standard new single-family detached house in a Southern suburb, increasing the estimated price by about $43,000.
NAHB’s Single-Family Detached House Price Estimator enables prospective homebuyers and homeowners to see the impact that various physical features might have on the price of a home.
“In an economic environment where consumers are particularly price-and value-conscious, this is an important resource for assessing key features and characteristics that help determine housing prices,” said NAHB Chairman Bob Nielsen. “To get the most out of the estimator, those using it need to understand that the nation’s housing marketplace is actually comprised of thousands of local markets and submarkets, with their own dynamics.”
Looking broadly at the four principal Census Bureau’s regions of the country and the urban status of areas – central city, suburb or non-metro – the estimator finds a general tendency for house prices to be higher in the Northeast and West, as well as in central cities and suburbs.
The price tends to be lowest for homes built outside of a metro area, although some regional variation exists regardless of urban status. The model estimates that the standard new home will cost more than $500,000 if it’s built in a suburb of one of the large metro areas in California, but only about $155,000 if it is located outside of a metropolitan area in the Midwest region.
The standard new single-family detached home is defined by the following features: the home has 2,150 square feet of living space, two full bathrooms and one half bath, three bedrooms, a garage, central air conditioning, a fireplace, a separate dining room and three miscellaneous rooms. The home is also in a neighborhood where satisfactory shopping (such as grocery or drug stores) is available within 15 minutes.
In general, the estimator finds that suburbs show higher prices than their companion central cities, which include the areas inside the city limits and not just a central business district or downtown area.
NAHB’s Single-Family Detached House Price Estimator, which can be accessed on computers with Microsoft Excel, is useful for giving prospective home buyers a rough idea of likely price differences for various home sizes and amenity packages and can be found at www.nahb.org/housepriceestimator.
