PHOENIX — The number of Valley zip codes in which the average list price for a home for sale is $1 million or more has quadrupled in the past four years, according to a real estate data firm that analyzes Maricopa and Pinal County housing data.
The Cromford Report lists 28 zip codes where the average listed price is one million dollars or more, up from seven in 2019. Seven of those zip codes are in Scottsdale. The northeast Valley is typically among the highest list price averages in the state. But there are newcomers to the list like 85284 (South Tempe), 85004 (Downtown Phoenix), and 85310 (North Peoria).
Cromford Report analyst Tina Tamboer advises prospective buyers to take the high averages with a grain of salt.
“[The 85284 zip code] has, in total, seven listings. One of them is for $2.5M, another is for $2.9M, so, yeah that’s going to throw your averages over a million,” Tamboer said.
She pointed out that many of the zip codes are very small and that the housing supply is low, so average is often not representative of what a prospective buyer is likely to have to pay.
Another caveat when looking at the average price is that these are list prices. The homes may never sell for their original list price.
However, it is significant that these many homes are being listed for $1 million or more, because of the new places where those expensive homes are popping up and because the median home price is still on a major rise.
Tamboer says more and more homes are unaffordable for more and more people. The Cromford Report considers “affordable” to be a monthly housing expenditure of 27% or less of monthly income.
“The estimated payment at today’s interest rates is about $2,300 a month,” Tamboer said. “You’d have to be making about $99,000 a year to afford that, to have that be 28% of your income. We don’t believe the median income is $99,000 a year right now.”
VERSIÓN EN ESPAÑOL: Más de 2 docenas de códigos postales en el Valle ahora tienen casas con precios promedio de $1 millón o más
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