10 Cities Where $1 Million Doesn’t Go a Long Way To Buy a House

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Depending on where you live, a million-dollar home can either be a mansion or a cottage — but you’re a lot more likely to see the latter than the former these days. The United States is home to a record-high 550 markets where the typical home value is $1 million or more, according to an April report from Zillow. That figure is up from 491 a year ago.

Even if you have $1 million to buy a home, you might not find one for sale at that price in certain cities. As Zillow noted, home prices in many markets continue to rise even though affordability is already a “big challenge” for buyers and has been for years. The overall U.S. housing market remains tight, marked by limited availability of homes for sale and intense competition for those that are. This competition leads to even higher prices.

The typical U.S. home is worth 4.2% more now than a year ago, Zillow reported. That rate is 4.6% in cities where the typical home value is at least $1 million.

California easily leads the way in terms of the most cities with million-dollar home values. The Golden State boasted 210 such cities as of February, followed by New York (66), New Jersey (49), Florida (32) and Massachusetts (31). Florida, Texas and Delaware are the only states with a net loss in million-dollar cities over the past year.

Here are 10 metropolitan areas where $1 million doesn’t go very far toward buying a house, based on the highest concentration of homes priced at $1 million or higher:

1. New York City
2. San Francisco
3. Los Angeles
4. Boston
5. San Jose, California
6. Miami-Fort Lauderdale
7. Seattle
8. Washington, D.C.
9. Santa Maria-Santa Barbara, California
10. San Diego

Of those cities, the costliest in terms of average sale price is San Jose, according to a new analysis from SmartAsset. The average home sale price in San Jose was just more than $1.5 million as of April 30. That was up 12.9% from the previous year and 41% from April 30, 2019.

The only other city on SmartAsset’s list with an average sale price higher than $1 million was San Francisco. Its price averaged $1.13 million as of April 30, a gain of 10.8% from the previous year.

Here are the other metro areas that rounded out the Top 10 in SmartAsset’s list. Average sale prices were accurate as of April 30.

• Los Angeles
  • Average home sale price: $925,783
  • Price increase over one year: 10.6%
• San Diego
  • Average home sale price: $876,056
  • Price increase over one year: 9.4%
• Oxnard, California
  • Average home sale price: $844,806
  • Price increase over one year: 8.2%
• Honolulu, Hawaii
  • Average home sale price: $696,729
  • Price increase over one year: 6.6%
• Seattle
  • Average home sale price: $692,195
  • Price increase over one year: 10.5%
• Boston
  • Average home sale price: $648,108
  • Price increase over one year: 8.1%
• New York City
  • Average home sale price: $579,117
  • Price increase over one year: 10.7%
• Denver
  • Average home sale price: $573,090
  • Price increase over one year: 3.0%

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