For many reasons, residents of Dallas-Fort Worth consider the region a gem. Now, the metro area has been declared a 2022 “hidden gem” among U.S. housing markets.

The National Association of Realtors recently identified 10 “hidden gem” housing markets that are expected to see strong appreciation in home prices in 2022 compared with other markets. The alphabetical list includes Dallas-Fort Worth and San Antonio.

“The housing sector performed spectacularly in 2021 in many markets, with huge gains achieved in places like Austin, Boise, and Naples,” Lawrence Yun, chief economist and senior vice president of research at the National Association of Realtors, says in a news release. “Several markets did reasonably well in 2021, but not as strong as the underlying fundamentals suggested. Therefore, in 2022, these ‘hidden gem’ markets have more room for growth.”

The National Association of Realtors made their picks based on two factors: the market’s ratio of median home price to median family income sits in the lower half of the 379 metro areas analyzed, and the market’s demand for housing (according to seven indicators) is within the upper half of the 379 metros.

One of the seven indicators is the share of residents ages 25 to 44. According to the National Association of Realtors, 29.1 percent of the population in DFW falls within that range, compared with the national average of 26.7 percent.

Another indicator takes into account the number of people moving to a metro from other places in the U.S., known as net domestic migration. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, DFW experienced the second highest net domestic migration in 2020 (58,026) among all U.S. metros.

“Strong migration into the [Dallas-Fort Worth] area will continue to create upward pressure for home values to increase further in 2022,” the association says.

Among the 10 metros on the “hidden gem” list, DFW and San Antonio ranked first and second, respectively, for net domestic migration in 2020. Compared with all metro areas, San Antonio ranked seventh for net domestic migration (25,798) that year. Texas, as a whole, could reach 30 million people in 2022, according to recent Census figures.

The Realtors association points out that the San Antonio area has the second lowest estimated median home value ($227,684) among the 10 metros on the list and is “much more affordable” compared with other major metros in Texas. Those metros are Austin ($410,653), DFW ($293,976), and Houston ($245,098).

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Source: CultureMap – https://dallas.culturemap.com/news/real-estate/01-04-22-dfw-hidden-gem-housing-market-2022-national-association-realtors/