7 States Where Prewar Homes Are Worth More Than the Typical Home

When it comes to your home’s value, advanced age isn’t always a bad thing.

As a general rule, newer homes are worth more than older ones. Nationwide, the typical owner-occupied home built as of 2020 is worth about $462,000, far more than the $340,000 value of the average overall home, which was built in 1981, according to Census Bureau data. of the recently published US.

Meanwhile, homes built before 1940, which make up about 12% of the US housing stock, have a national median value of just $272,000.

But in seven states, along with Washington, D.C., pre-1940 homes are typically worth more than the average home, according to a Realtor.com® analysis of data from the 2023 American Community Survey.

They are California, Hawaii, Louisiana, Oregon, Florida, Massachusetts and Alaska.

It is an unusual group of states, spanning both coasts and including two non-contiguous states, neither of which had statehood in 1940.

Among these states, California has the largest price premium for prewar homes, with the pre-1940 median value of $930,100 exceeding the overall median home value by more than $200,000.

The difference in values ​​does not appear to be based on size. In California at least, the average pre-1940 home has 13% less square footage and is 18% smaller in floor space than the typical home built from 1940 onward, according to data from the Real Estate Intelligence Platform. LocalLogic real estate.

At the local level, California has 12 metro areas where pre-1940 values ​​exceed typical values, the most of any state.

The largest metro level gap in the country is in Santa Barbara County, where older homes typically go for $1,593,900, roughly double the local median.

Known as the American Riviera, Santa Barbara first boomed with wealth in the early 1900s, first with the world’s first offshore oil drilling operation and then as the home of the world’s largest film studio during the era of silent. Many of the stately homes of that period still stand today.

However, in nearby affluent Santa Barbara and Montecito, which are split between the Pacific Ocean and the Santa Ynez Mountains, space for new construction is limited and zoning restrictions are extremely tight, making some of the most the area’s most coveted vintages, Amanda explains. Lee, a real estate agent with the Agency.

“These old houses just have a character that you can’t replicate,” says Lee. “Celebrities love to come in and live among these homes that have an old world charm and charm.”

The Montecito area is home to Oprah Winfrey, Ellen DeGeneres, as well as Meghan Markle and Prince Harry.

Lee recently listed a Santa Barbara mansion built in 1922 and designed by Reginald Davis Johnson, one of the area’s most prominent architects. The four-bedroom, 5,058-square-foot Spanish Colonial underwent a historic restoration and expansion in the ’90s and is now listed for $9.6 million.

“It’s rare to see a house like this come on the market,” says Lee. “They’re really in demand, and the fact that someone can actually move in and not have to do any remodeling is pretty special.”

On the East Coast, Massachusetts has the most valuable stock of antebellum homes. The typical home built before 1940 in the Bay State is worth $591,200, compared to the overall state average of $570,800.

Older homes on Cape Cod may be a major driver of the trend. In Barnstable Town, the official name of the statistical area that includes Cape Cod, older homes are typically worth $786,700, a 24% increase from the median value.

Boston and Amherst also follow the trend, albeit with smaller differences in value between older and newer homes.

After California, Florida is the state with the most local areas where older homes are worth more than the typical home.

Florida has 10 metro areas showing the trend, including Panama City, where pre-1940 homes are worth 123% more than the local average, and the Naples-Marco Island area, where the gap is 73%.

Further along the Gulf Coast, the gap between prewar and postwar homes is also wide in Louisiana. The typical Louisiana home built before 1940 is worth $286,900, which is 33% more than the statewide average.

In New Orleans, known for its historic homes in and around the French Quarter, the median-priced pre-1940 home is worth 76% more than the local standard.

Indeed, many of the cities where older homes are most valuable have well-preserved historic centers, where older homes are located on the city’s prime real estate.

“In states and metros where homes built before 1940 are valued higher than the average home, the main driver for this change is largely location,” says Realtor.com Senior Economist Joel Berner. “As cities expand, newer buildings tend to be larger and sit on more land, but further from city centers, where factors such as walkability and vibrancy give an advantage to older homes in more central neighborhoods.”

Berner says this is especially true in cities such as Boston and New Orleans that have made efforts to preserve the character of historic neighborhoods, and also in areas that have a geographic feature like a beach that proximity makes a home more desirable. .

The trend continues in both Anchorage, AK and Honolulu, where pre-1940 homes are not only more valuable than the average home, but also more valuable than even newer homes built as of 2020.

In Anchorage, pre-war homes, which are mostly clustered near the city’s historic core, are typically worth $797,500, which is 115% more than the median home value and 52% more than homes built since 2020.

On Honolulu Island, homes built before 1940 are mostly located either in the center of Urban Honolulu or along the main shores of the island.

They are typically worth $1.08 million, which is 21% more than the overall average and 16% more than homes built this decade.

“Houses built before 1940 that are still around today are around for a reason, usually that they have some kind of historic preservation associated with them or that they’re in the most desirable part of a city,” says Berner.