Condo prices in oceanfront counties see second-quarter surge

by | Aug 26, 2021



Condo prices in oceanfront counties experienced a surge in prices following the June collapse of the Champlain Towers South condominiums in Surfside.

ATTOM, a multi-sourced national property database that aggregates property data for more than 150 million U.S. properties, released on Thursday a special report looking at condominium sales and prices in oceanfront counties around the U.S. The report found that median condo prices in 50 percent of those oceanfront counties surpassed the typical $305,000 condo price nationwide, while median condo values and price increases in oceanfront counties in the second quarter of 2021 closely tracked national trends.

It also revealed that median condominium prices increased during the second quarter of 2021 by at least 20 percent, measured year over year, in slightly more than half of the oceanfront counties analyzed. Less-expensive oceanfront condo markets, concentrated in the South, generally showed bigger year-over-year gains, while the most expensive counties, located mainly in the West, showed the smallest.

“Condos in oceanfront areas appear to be right in the middle of the pack when it comes to the ongoing market boom. Broadly speaking, they are worth close to what condos around the nation are worth and are gaining value at around the same pace as all homes in the U.S.,” said Todd Teta, chief product officer with ATTOM. “We will keep an eye on this trend to see if it changes following the Florida incident.”

The report looked at 86 counties around the country that bordered the Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean or the Gulf of Mexico and had enough data to analyze, meaning that they had at least 25 condo sales in the second quarter of 2021, the first quarter of 2021 and the second quarter of last year. The report sought to analyze condo price trends in areas similar to the one where the building collapsed in Surfside.

The second-quarter-of-2021 condo price gains in oceanfront counties came at a time when the national housing market boom was roaring into its 10th year, with median single-family home and condo prices rising annually by more than 15 percent across a majority of the U.S. Condo values have continued to rise in oceanfront areas amid a combination of historically low mortgage rates and the ongoing appeal of living along or near oceanside communities.

The South experienced the most and highest condo sales in oceanfront counties during the second quarter.

The Southern region of the U.S. had 69,616, or 67 percent, of the 104,359 condo sales in the 86 counties (The report included condos directly on the waterfront, as well as those inland, in each oceanfront county). Additionally the highest second-quarter median prices were in Walton County, FL (along the Florida Panhandle) ($475,000)Monroe County (Key West), FL ($465,150)Nassau County, FL (north of Jacksonville($416,750)Baldwin County, AL (east of Mobile($351,563) and St. Johns County (St. Augustine), FL ($329,414).

The Sunshine State touted the most sales in the second quarter (58,404), followed by California (20,042), Hawaii (4,686), South Carolina (4,617) and Massachusetts (4,198).

“It’s important to note that this report is not, in any way, an attempt to show where condos may be vulnerable to the kind of disaster that hit in Florida. That’s not what our data can address. Rather, it’s a look at the markets for those kinds of homes, which look to be going strong,” Teta added.

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