The Top 10 Housing Markets of 2025 Are All in the South and West — Experts Explain Why
Written by
Josephine Nesbit
Edited by
Amber Barkley
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The U.S. housing market has been a rollercoaster of a ride over the last five years. The 2025 real estate market could see some improvements, especially for several markets across the South and West.
According to Realtor.com’s Top Housing Markets for 2025 report, housing inventory is expected to improve as dropping mortgage rates and time will help ease the mortgage lock-in effect on existing homeowners. Builders are also expected to increase production to ease the housing deficit. Nationwide home sales may edge slightly higher thanks to moderating home price growth, but some markets are projected to see stronger growth in sales and prices in 2025.
Top Housing Metros
Realtor.com ranked the largest 100 metropolitan areas by expected sale and price growth rates, and the top 10 markets are exclusively in the South and West. Here are the top 10 metros for 2025:
- Colorado Springs, Colorado
- Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, Florida
- Virginia Beach-Norfolf-Newport News, Virginia-North Carolina
- El Paso, Texas
- Richmond, Virginia
- Orlando, Kissimmee-Sanford, Florida
- McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas
- Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, Arizona
- Atlanta, Sandy Springs-Alpharetta, Georgia
- Greensboro-High Point, North Carolina
What Makes These Markets the Best?
“Unsurprisingly, the top 10 housing markets for 2025 are primarily in Texas, Florida, Virginia and Colorado, with no (Texas and Florida) or low (2% to 5.75% in Virginia and 4.4% in Colorado) individual state income taxes,” said Laura Adams, senior driving and real estate analyst at AceableAgent. “Residents in cities like Colorado Springs (No. 1), Miami (No. 2), Virginia Beach (No. 3), El Paso (No. 4) and Richmond (No. 5) typically enjoy mild weather, abundant recreation and relatively low-cost living — with Miami as an exception.”
Adams also pointed out that many of the top 10 housing markets have active new home construction and enough existing home sellers to satisfy potential buyers.
“Some, like McAllen and Miami, have many high-net-worth homeowners without a mortgage or a lock-in effect that can keep homeowners with low-rate mortgages from putting their properties up for sale,” Adams added.
Holden Andrews, real estate investor and founder of Helpful Home Group, added that the better weather in the sunbelt states draws in more investors, and these states are typically more landlord-friendly, making it easier for landlords to protect their investments.
“An example is the eviction laws in Texas are much more friendly than in California,” Andrews explained. “This again draws in more investors, causing demand to increase.”
He also believes it’s because tech companies have made major investments in these sunbelt states, particularly Microsoft and Amazon in the Miami-Dade County area.
“These investments cause an increase on migration to these areas, and this influx of … high-paying tech jobs over the past two to four years to Miami is a contributing factor, because there is more demand for housing and the supply has not been able to keep up with demand, causing these markets to grow from competition,” he concluded.
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