Compare two cities on housing market data

What each metric on a comparison page means

Nine numbers appear on every comparison. Here is what each one is, where it comes from, and — more usefully — what it changes about your decision when you are choosing between two markets rather than evaluating one.

Typical home value (ZHVI) — Zillow, monthly

Zillow's estimate of what a mid-market home is worth right now, across the whole housing stock rather than only the homes that sold. Because it is not a transaction average, it does not lurch when the mix of what traded changes, which makes it the fairest single number for setting two cities side by side. It is also the only headline price series on this site that is still being published, so every comparison leads with it.

Value change over 12 months — Zillow, monthly

The same index against its reading a year earlier. On a multi-year hold, direction matters more than level: a cheaper city appreciating faster is closing the gap on the expensive one every month you own it, and an expensive one that has stalled has stopped compounding against you. Two cities at the same price with opposite trajectories are not the same decision.

Median sale price — Redfin, final at May 2026

What actually closed: half of sales above, half below. It is a real transaction record rather than a model, which is its value, and it swings with the mix of homes that happened to sell, which is its weakness. Treat it as the transaction-level check on the value index, not as a substitute for it.

Price per square foot — Redfin, final at May 2026

The size-adjusted price, and the row that most often reverses the headline verdict. A cheaper city whose typical home is much smaller can cost more per square foot than the expensive one, which means your budget buys less space than the price gap implies. If you are moving for room, this row matters more than the median.

Days on market — Redfin, final at May 2026

Median time from listing to accepted offer. It does not tell you what you will pay; it tells you how you have to behave. Under about three weeks you need financing arranged before you tour and you will be asked to compress your contingencies. Past two months you have time to inspect, compare and negotiate on price and repairs.

Months of supply — Redfin, final at May 2026

How long it would take to clear every active listing at the current pace of sales. Under 3 favours sellers, over 6 favours buyers, 3 to 6 is the balanced band. Between two cities, the one with more supply is the one where an offer below asking, a repair credit or a closing-cost concession is realistically on the table.

Active inventory — Redfin, final at May 2026

The raw count of homes for sale. Read it against population rather than on its own: 2,000 listings is abundant choice in a mid-size metro and thin in a large one. The comparison pages print both figures next to each other for exactly this reason.

Typical asking rent (ZORI) — Zillow, monthly

Zillow's index of asking rents on new leases. Divided into the home value it produces the price-to-rent ratio, which is the one measure that puts two cities with completely different price levels on the same scale. Below about 15x, buying tends to win on monthly cost; above about 20x, renting does unless you stay long enough for appreciation to close the gap.

Median household income — U.S. Census ACS, annual

American Community Survey five-year estimates. A price means nothing without the income that has to carry it: home value divided by median income gives the price-to-income multiple, where roughly 3x was the postwar U.S. norm and 5x or more is strained. A stretched multiple usually shows up as a larger required down payment and more declined applications rather than as a lower price.

How to read one of these comparisons

1. Start at the price gap, then immediately test it

Every comparison page opens by naming the cheaper city and the size of the gap in dollars and percent. That is the answer most people came for, and it is also the number most likely to mislead on its own. The first two things that can undo it are on the same page: price per square foot, which tells you whether the cheaper city is cheaper or merely smaller, and price-to-income, which tells you whether the cheaper city is cheap in absolute terms or only relative to what people there earn. A city can be 30% cheaper on price and no cheaper at all on either of those.

2. Convert the price gap into a monthly gap

Purchase price is not what you live with; the payment is. Each page prints principal and interest at both 20% and 5% down at the current Freddie Mac 30-year fixed rate, side by side, plus the cash needed at close in each scenario. Do this conversion before you get attached to a city, because the two constraints bind in different places: a lower price with a small down payment can produce a larger monthly obligation than a higher price with a large one, and the entry cheque, not the payment, is what stops most first purchases.

3. Read the pace and supply rows as instructions, not scores

Days on market, months of supply and the sale-to-list ratio are not a ranking of which city is better. They are a description of how a buyer has to operate in each one. A 20-day, 2.5-month-supply market with a sale-to-list ratio over 100% is telling you to have financing in hand, to expect competing offers, and to budget above asking. A 70-day, 6-month-supply market with a ratio under 100% is telling you there is room in the price and time to use it. If the two cities you are comparing sit on opposite sides of that line, your offer strategy has to change with the move.

4. Check the dates before you trust a difference

Every figure on a comparison page carries a source and a period, and this is not decoration. Zillow's indices are current and monthly; Redfin's are final at May 2026 and will not move again. A gap computed across those two series would be partly a gap between two dates rather than between two cities, so the pages never do it — the headline verdict is built on Zillow for both cities, or on Redfin for both cities, and it says which.

5. Finish below the city line

City-level data shortlists; it does not pick. Prices inside a single city routinely spread 50% or more from its least to its most expensive ZIP, which is wider than many of the city-to-city gaps on this page. Once two markets are on your shortlist, open each city page, work down to the ZIPs in your price band, and run the payment on a specific target price rather than on the citywide typical value.

Then model it with your own inputs: mortgage calculator, affordability calculator, rent vs. buy calculator. For how we classify a market as favouring buyers or sellers see the methodology, and for the update cadence of every series see data sources.