Suburban Philly Real Estate Market Broke Records In 3rd Quarter

SUBURBAN PHILADELPHIA — The pandemic has caused widespread economic impacts, but there remains one bright spot for residents in suburban Philadelphia: the local real estate market is thriving.

According to a new report from Drexel University's Lindy Institute for Urban Studies, the suburban Philadelphia real estate market hit many record highs in the third quarter of 2020, including highest number of million-dollar homes ever sold in a single quarter.

"Philadelphia’s suburbs had one of its best quarters ever since the last recession," the report summary states. The report includes data from counties in both Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware. The counties in the report include Bucks, Montgomery, Chester, Delaware and Philadelphia in Pennsylvania; Mercer, Burlington, Camden, Gloucester and Salem in New Jersey; and New Castle in Delaware.

The report said house prices in the suburban counties shifted "significantly upwards."

The suburban house price index grew by 4.5 percent in the third quarter, the report states, "making this quarter one of the suburb’s best quarters in ten years."

The median price for a suburban home in the Philadelphia region is up to the highest level ever. The median suburban house was $300,000 in the third quarter, which is the first time it has ever crossed that mark, the report said.

Notably, million-dollar sales across the region broke a new record by a "huge" margin.

According to the report:

There were 470 home sales at a price of one million dollars or more across the region in Q3, with 90 percent of them occurring in the suburbs. Not only is this 49 percent higher than the previous record of 316 +$1M sales set one year ago, it is also 167 percent higher than the region’s quarterly average of 176 such sales.

Additionally, the supply of homes is low, driving up prices.

At the current pace of sales, there is only 1.4 month’s supply of inventory in the suburbs, the report states. "Anything below five months is considered by the industry to be indicative of a seller’s market, with conditions favoring sellers over buyers, and thus placing upward pressure on house prices."

The data varies by county; you can see the full breakdown of price indices in the accompanying charts found here: Philadelphia Regional Housing Report: Q3 2020