These Are the Best Real Estate Markets in the U.S. Right Now

Real estate can be a volatile industry with lots of ups and downs. In particular, the housing market has seen plenty of changes throughout the years—currently, WalletHub reports that the housing market is skewed toward sellers with mortgage rates climbing and home values having risen over 1.4% in the last year on average.

To help those who are home shopping or wanting to get into the industry, the personal finance site put together a list of the best real estate markets in the United States. The WalletHub team compiled their rankings by comparing 300 U.S. cities across 17 key indicators of housing-market attractiveness and economic strength, including Zillow’s Home Value Forecast, median home-price appreciation, median days on the market, housing affordability, maintenance affordability, and population growth rate.

“Current home prices are extremely important, but there’s much more that you need to look at when determining the health of a city’s real estate market,” says Chip Lupo, WalletHub analyst. “Factors like the cost of living, the potential for the value of homes to increase, the availability of recently-built homes and the quality of the city’s job market are all important to consider in conjunction with asking prices and interest rates. The best cities may not always be the cheapest, but they offer excellent housing options and long-term stability.” 

So which city came out on top? McKinney, Texas, took the number one spot due to its recent growth. The city has the second-highest share of houses built between 2010 and 2023, at about 38%, which means buyers have a lot of housing options that won’t need major maintenance updates. It also has the third-highest number of building permits per capita, which means that more housing is being built. 

Cary, North Carolina, came in second due to its low cost of living. It also has the fourth-lowest home energy costs in the country and the fifth-lowest phone service costs and home maintenance costs. And while the city ranks 96th for housing affordability, housing values in Cary are forecasted to rise by 0.1% per year, making it the 45th-highest increase among the 300 cities in the study.

And if you’re wondering about Western representation on the top 10 list—don’t worry, Irvine, California, ranked third. The Orange County city has the third-highest share of houses that were built between 2010 and 2023, at about 32%. Irvine is the 11th-cheapest city for phone service, 20th-cheapest for maintenance and energy, has the 15th-lowest mortgage delinquency rate, and has the 16th-highest median credit score. It also has one of the best job growth rates in the country.

Take a look at the top 10 list below:

1. McKinney, Texas
2. Cary, North Carolina
3. Irvine, California
4. Durham, North Carolina
5. Richardson, Texas
6. Frisco, Texas
7. Gilbert, Arizona
8. Nashville, Tennessee
9. Denton, Texas
10. Allen, Texas