Reno’s “Million Dollar Creep”

Home search portal, Trulia, last week released the results of a study showing the increase in the share of million dollar homes across the United States – a trend the piece refers to as “million dollar creep”. See Million Dollar Creep: Where Seven Figure Homes are the New Normal.

The piece ranked the country’s 100 largest metro area’s by those that have seen the largest increase in the share of million dollar homes from 2012 to today. Not surprisingly Bay Area metros (e.g. S.F., San Jose, and Oakland) led the list — followed by metros in Southern California, Hawaii, and the Northeast. See the link above for the complete list.

Reading the story prompted me to take a closer look at our own market’s million dollar home segment.

I pulled all houses listed at $1M and above during 2012 and compared that to the number listed so far in 2016. I found that the number of million dollar listings in the Reno-Sparks market has nearly doubled since 2012. See the table below.

I then took a look at closed sales of houses — comparing the same time period. I found that the current rate of $1M+ sales in the Reno-Sparks market is triple that in 2012. See the table below.

By percent change, that kind of increase would place Reno and Sparks in the top echelon of the ranking of cities.

2012 2016*
All Priced at $1M+ Share of $1M+ All Priced at $1M+ Share of $1M+ Percent Change in Share
Listings 6,600 124 1.88% 3,319 120 3.62% 92.44%
Sales 6,099 26 0.43% 2,257 30 1.33% 211.80%

* – partial year

Note: The home price data reported above covers the cities of Reno, Nevada and Sparks, Nevada [NNRMLS Area #100]. Residential data includes Site/Stick Built properties only. Data excludes Condo/Townhouse, Manufactured/Modular and Shared Ownership properties. Data courtesy of the Northern Nevada Regional MLS – May 24, 2016. Note: This information is deemed reliable, but not guaranteed.

2 comments

  1. Ray Hancock

    Reality check.. Look at your math the percentage went up, because the low end volume went down,

    26 to 30 homes sold isnt even double, and four years supply of million dollar homes isnt a healthy market… lots of people dreaming on what there house is worth,

  2. Guy Johnson

    Ray, Thank you for your comment.

    The 26 $1M+ homes referenced in the table above was the total number sold for all of 2012. The 30 homes referenced in the table above is current total for 2016 year-to-date — a partial year.

    At the current rate of sales of $1M+ houses, 2016's total number will likely be triple 2012's total.

    The "percent change" column references the change in the respective "shares".

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