Spring Market Update: The Return of Condominiums

Across metro-Atlanta, in the month of April, the average sale price of a single family home was $465k. That is a 17% increase from 2021’s average of $396k for a single family home. In addition, inventory levels are down 11% from last year and 63% from two years ago. 2022’s average months of inventory (based on closed sales) remains the same as last year’s historic 1 month of supply. These past couple of months, the real change occurred in two market segments: townhome and condominiums. For a concise overview, below are the months of supply by product type as follows:

Condos: 1 months of supply

A decrease from 2.4, 60 % year over year.

Townhomes: 0.7 month of supply

A decrease from 1.5 year over year.

The Return of Condominiums

The macro-amenity of condo living: city amenities, have returned in a major way such as parks, the new Westside Park, extensions of the Beltline, new restaurants, the new Colony Square, the Krog Street Market expansion, Ponce City Market expansion, and much more are providing more reasons than ever to live the lock-and-leave lifestyle of condominiums. All these amenities are just a quick stroll, bike, or Uber ride away. Condominiums have seen the largest year over year price appreciation out of all home types this past year. The average sales price increase 22% and the average PPSF (price per square foot) increased 14%. Unlike new construction single family homes and townhomes, condominiums are more difficult to finance, take longer to build, and are usually bound to highly urbanized and amenitized areas where land is more expensive.

However, with workers returning to the office more regularly in the city, commutes have once again become a key factor in everyone’s home owning decision. Multiple businesses are also moving back in office, and expanding their offices to Midtown, West Midtown, and surrounding areas. Georgia has been quickly gaining steam in various industries, including tech. A wave of tech giants are expanding into Atlanta such as AirBnB, Visa, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and many others. These companies are in the process of adding to their already tremendous work force by tens of thousands of employees over the next several years in metro-Atlanta.

With that, traffic data from the Georgia Department of Transportation shows that early 2022 saw the return of traffic levels to that of right before the pandemic. This is the busiest that Atlanta roads have ever been, and it will only increase. Based on the trends, along with thousands of new residents, we will soon surpass previous traffic congestion levels. So, what does that mean for current residents? On average, commute times are increasing by around 3 minutes each month. Currently, the average Atlanta commute is 34 minutes (one way). By summer, this is estimated to be just over 40 minutes (one way).

On a positive note, bike lanes, sidewalks, trails, and other alternate transportation methods are quickly gaining traction and infrastructure support from the city, leading to drastically lower commute times for those living in condominiums close to work. For example, the Juniper Street Project, Westside beltline trail, West Peachtree project, etc. are a few of the ways that the city is trying to make transportation more feasible as our city continues to expand. The Atlanta region’s Transportation Improvement Program, or TIP, allocated $45 million—the initial round of funds from the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act passed last year. The city plans to use these funds in efforts to help us build a safer, better connected, and more equitable modes of transportation.

For more in-depth information on this time of growth and change as it relates to the market visit https://evatlanta.com/market-research/.