Small cities in the Northeast and Midwest as well as a few larger metros in the South are becoming trendy places to live with community amenities suited for younger buyers. Best of all, Realtor.com’s top ten up-and-coming cities are still relatively affordable for first-time buyers. Savannah, Georgia takes the top spot with renowned restaurants, pedestrian-friendly city blocks, and a median listing price of $340,403.
In the Northeast, cities like Philadelphia ranked high on Realtor.com’s 2021 list thanks to local boutique hotels, markets, and quaint neighborhoods, where homes are listed for an average price of $312,450.
To come up with our list, the Realtor.com data team looked through the country’s 300 largest metro areas in search of ones that have a young, culture-rich urban experience but also plenty of affordable homes for sale.
To be included, each metro had to have plenty of amenities loved by the trendy set: yoga studios, breweries, and art house theaters, to name a few. Each metro recorded an increase in the population of 25- to 34-year-olds moving to the area from 2018 to 2019, according to the latest data available from the U.S. Census Bureau.
In order to weed out areas that could be out of reach for first-time homebuyers, we limited the list to places where the median home list price was $400,000 or less in November by using Realtor.com listing data. (Metros include the main city and the surrounding suburbs, towns, and smaller urban areas.)
For Realtor.com’s full list of the trendiest cities in America …