A recent analysis by real estate information company Zillow Group found that the Hartford metropolitan region had the lowest price per-square-foot for homes costing over $1 million, followed by the Midwest.
Among the 50 major metro areas in the study, Hartford was where $1 million would buy the most real estate – 4,873 square feet, the study found.
Hartford was followed by Indianapolis, Oklahoma City, Kansas City and Cincinnati.
Zillow’s study found that “shrinkflation” has resulted in the size of a $1 million home dropping 397 square feet since 2020. At the same time, sales of $1 million-plus homes more than doubled during the pandemic.
Nationally, more than twice as many such homes were sold this spring compared to 2019, according to Zillow.
The size of a $1 million home dropped in nearly every major metropolitan area. The size peaked at 3,021 square feet in the middle of 2020, to a low of 2,530 square feet in early 2022, according to Zillow.
“Buyers with seven-figure budgets shopping for homes during the pandemic were doing so coming off the longest period of economic growth in U.S. history and with the help of historically low interest rates,” said Anushna Prakash, economic data analyst at Zillow. “Sales for expensive homes soared while buyers in the heat of competition accepted smaller layouts.”
Home sales have slowed in recent months, according to Zillow. This rebalancing has shifted competition away from mid- and high-tier properties, and back to the most affordable homes, the company said.
Sales for homes priced at $1 million or more rose from 43,421 in the second quarter of 2019 to 90,110 in 2022, according to the study. Meanwhile, the share of single-family homes that sold for at least $1 million more than doubled, moving from 2.7% in 2019 to 6.4% now.
