Southern Metros Lead the U.S. for Spacious Homes

Something that has lingered for many people in the aftermath of the pandemic is the desire to live in wide-open, airy spaces where they can live, work, play and have a sense of privacy—all under one roof.

With the ongoing trend of remote work, purchasing a big home is gaining even more traction for  those that are trying to enter the market or are renting across the U.S.

However, getting access to spacious living might be challenging these days, especially if you’re not ready to let go of your urban lifestyle. Sizes of both residential lots and houses have generally been on a downward slope during the last decade whereas prices have been trending up.

The median size of a new single family home is sitting at around 2,299 square feet, down 4% from 2013 to 2022. Similarly, median home lots have dwindled by 8%, to 8,891 square feet, during the same period.

The home price of a new home in the meantime has soared to an all-time high—roughly $457K in 2022, up 70% from 2013.

Looking at city-level data, nuance becomes a problem as there are significant regional variations in home prices. Living large is becoming less attainable in land-strapped environments like Philadelphia, PA, or expensive hotspots like California’s coastal hubs. In Philly, for example, housing lots are now 43% smaller than they were a decade earlier. In Los Angeles, CA, an average home covering 1,576 square feet on a 6,900-square-foot lot costs north of $1M, double what a similarly sized home called for ten years prior.

But data is clear: as you move away from the coasts, your chances of finding a big home on a large lot for entertaining improve substantially. In fact, according to anotther StorageCafe, the South reigns supreme for spacious, liveable areas.

To determine the most attractive urban destinations for Americans in search of both generous homes and expansive backyards, StorageCafe ranked all of the top-50 metropolitan areas based on a combined metric of the median size of homes and the median size of the lots they’re sitting on. Additionally, they added other factors such as home prices, median household incomes, safety and commute times to see how accessible and desirable those cities are for homebuyers.

Seven southern cities made the top 10 of hotspots for spacious living, including Raleigh, North Carolina, Atlanta, Georgia, and Charlotte, North Carolina, which occupy the first three spots in the ranking. A couple of midsized Californian cities also make good relocation candidates for people hunting for space.

Click here for a complete breakdown of StorageCafe's findings.