Ranking It

Where is it great to be a first-time homebuyer? All over North Texas.

As anyone looking for a house in Dallas-Fort Worth right now can tell you, the real estate market here is red hot. And according to a new study by WalletHub, the suburbs surrounding Dallas are some of the best cities in the country for first-time buyers.

In fact, North Texas nabbed five of the top 10 slots and nine of the top 20: Allen ranks No. 2, followed by Frisco (5), Plano (6), Carrollton (7), McKinney (8), Grand Prairie (11), Richardson (12), Garland (17) and Arlington (20).

Denton and Irving landed at Nos. 23 and 24, respectively, while Fort Worth came in at No. 42. Dallas brought up the rear at No. 93. The No. 1 city for first-time homebuyers is Overland Park, Kansas.

The WalletHub study looked at 300 American cities and determined the rankings using three general categories: housing affordability, real estate market and living environment. If the rankings had been based solely on the market, Dallas would have come in at No. 2. But an abysmal ranking of 282 in housing affordability and a 76 in living environment sent the city plummeting.

Three Dallas suburbs rank in the top five for highest median annual income (adjusted for cost of inflation): Frisco (No. 1), Allen (No. 3) and McKinney (No. 5). Frisco also scored well (No. 2) for highest median home-price appreciation. Dallas was not too far behind, at No. 5.

With multiple big companies moving into the northern 'burbs and property values heading northward, first-time home buyers might need to act fast to take advantage of the current market friendliness.

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Dallas was a top-10 destination for Gen Zers on the move for 2023

Photo by Lance Asper on Unsplash

Who wouldn't want to live in a Gen Z paradise like Dallas?

As Gen Z enters adulthood, many are flocking to the nation's biggest cultural hubs like New York City, Los Angeles — and now Dallas, which had the ninth-highest inflow of Gen Zers in 2023.

Dallas' new reputation as a Gen Z hotspot was unveiled in a recent report by American home improvement brand This Old House, which analyzed migration trends across multiple generations using 2023 U.S. Census Bureau data.

Dallas saw an influx of 13,770 Gen Z residents last year to become the generation's No. 9 most popular city. That's 4,223 more Gen Zers than the net migration rate from 2022, the report found.

Real estate marketplace Zillow seems to agree on a statewide scale, declaring Texas as the No. 1 destination for Gen Zers on the move in 2024.

However, as Gen Z Dallasites may have learned, it's going to take a big bite out of their paychecks to live in such a highly sought after city. A March RentCafe housing cost analysis predicted Gen Z adults living in Dallas are likely to spend over $149,000 on rent by the time they are 30 years old.

While Dallas saw big gains in its Gen Z population last year, many other big cities saw a mass exodus. Plano, for example — which gained 1,295 Gen Z residents in 2022 — lost 4,028 Gen Zers in 2023, the report discovered.

The biggest Gen-Z exodus was in El Paso, with a drop of 5,607 — "a sharp turn from 2022 when the city saw an increase," the report said. "Other cities, including Plano, Texas; Memphis, Tennessee; McKinney, Texas; and Wichita, Kansas, are seeing similar declines."

"Gen X, baby boomers, and the Silent Generation are also moving away from major cities, particularly New York City and Washington, D.C.," the report said. "They’re heading to some of the same cities as Gen Z, including Houston and Jacksonville, Florida."

The top 10 cities that gained the most Gen Z residents in 2023 are:

No. 1 – New York City, New York
No. 2 – Los Angeles, California
No. 3 – Houston, Texas
No. 4 – Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
No. 5 – Chicago, Illinois
No. 6 – San Diego, California
No. 7 – Seattle, Washington
No. 8 – Charlotte, North Carolina
No. 9 – Dallas, Texas
No. 10 – Minneapolis, Minnesota

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