As the table and charts below illustrate, the St. Louis Metropolitatn Area (MSA) has undergone significant demographic shifts over the past 50 years, marked by a stark contrast between the population trends in the City of St. Louis and its surrounding counties.
St Louis MSA and Major Counties Population 1970-2022
The decline in the City of St. Louis’s population sharply contrasts with the growth in surrounding counties. During the same period that St. Charles County witnessed a 345% increase and the St. Louis MSA as a whole saw nearly a 60% rise, the City of St. Louis experienced nearly a 70% drop in population.
Over the last 50 years, the St. Louis MSA has undergone significant shifts in its population, characterized by substantial declines in the City of St. Louis and remarkable growth in suburban counties. This trend can largely be attributed to a combination of factors, including urban blight, which is characterized by the deterioration and abandonment of buildings, leading to a diminished quality of life and decreased property values. The escalation of crime rates further compounded the city’s challenges, rendering it less appealing for families and individuals in search of safe, stable environments. Furthermore, governance issues, marked by inefficient public services and policies that failed to effectively address the needs of urban residents, have also contributed to the population decline. These factors, coupled with the allure of suburban living—offering more spacious living conditions, better educational facilities, and a perceived higher level of safety—have propelled the demographic shift away from the city center and towards the suburbs.
St Louis MSA and City of St Louis Population – 1970 – 2022 Chart
(click on chart for live interactive chart)
St Louis Major Counties Population- 1970 – 2022 Chart
During the 3rd quarter of this year, there were 1,200 properties with foreclosure filings in the St. Louis MSA, according to the U.S. Foreclosure Market Report by ATTOM Data. This marks a 17% increase in St. Louis foreclosures from the prior quarter and an increase of 32% in St Louis foreclosure activity from a year ago.
The table below reveals that the city of St Louis saw the most foreclosures during 3rd quarter, followed by the Illinois counties of St Clair and Madison.
As a result of rising interest rates and home prices at levels higher than increases in income, homes in St Louis continue to become less affordable. In fact, according to data just released by ATTOM Data Research, home affordability declined double digits during the 3rd quarter of this year in all five counties that make up the St Louis core market. As the info graphic below illustrates, the percentage of wages needed to buy a home have, depending upon county, increased about a third to almost half from the historical “norm”.
Least affordable ever…
Three of the five counties that make up the St Louis Core market (St Louis, St Louis City, and St Charles) hit the least affordable levels ever during 3rd quarter, with Franklin County hitting its lowest level last quarter and seeing a slight uptick in affordability during 3rd quarter. Conversely, Jefferson County saw its least affordable quarter back in 2007.
Most affordable ever…
We have to take a quick stroll down memory lane to visit when homes were most affordable in the St Louis area. Franklin County had its most affordable quarter just back in 2020, St Louis County was back in 2013, Jefferson and St Charles 2012 and the City of St Louis had its most affordable quarter over 14 years ago in 2009.
St Louis Home Affordability – 3rd Quarter 2023
(click on image below for full infographic showing all info)
Last month, city of St Louis mayor, Tishaura Jones, signed into law a new ordinance which provides “access to legal representation for tenants facing eviction or equivalent proceedings”. Surprisingly, it does not appear that the tenant needs to show a final hardship or need for “full legal representation” to be provided at no cost as the bill defines a “covered individual” as “any residential tenant who occupies a dwelling located within the City under a claim of legal right, other than the legal property owner of the dwelling.” Another interesting thing in the ordinance is that it appears to include legal representation for not only in the case of an eviction but also in the case of a non-renewal of a lease as Section Four of the ordinance (General Provisions of Right To Counsel for Tenants In Covered Proceedings) states “A covered individual may access legal representation as provided in this ordinance as soon as a landlord provides notice to terminate or not renew a tenancy, or as soon thereafter as is practicable.”
Then, according to reports, yesterday, St. Louis Aldermanic President Megan Green announced that legislation was being drafted to require landlords in the City of St Louis to provide contact information as part of the City’s occupancy permit process. Aldermanic President Green stated “It will help the city better keep track of who is owning certain properties so if there’s issues with properties there’s a local agent requirement, instead of trying to track down a random person registered to an LLC, which is often a challenge,” Landlords will also be required to report the rental amount they are charging according to Green.
Green also announced that the Board of Aldermen plan to consider a “tenants bill of rights” as well.
There were 4,017 building permits issued for new single-family homes in the St Louis area during the 12-month period ended June 30, 2023. This represents a decrease of 11.05% from the prior 12-month period, during which 4,516 permits were issued, according to the latest data from the Home Builders Association of St. Louis & Eastern Missouri (St Louis HBA). Six of the seven counties covered in the report saw a decline in building permits from the previous period, with the City of St Louis and Lincoln County experiencing double-digit declines.
A new report just released by ATTOM Data revealed that nearly one of every four homeowners (24.3 %) in the city of St Louis that have a mortgage, are underwater on equity (meaning property owner owes at least 25% more on their home than the current value). At the other end of the spectrum was St Charles County where just 3.9% of homeowners with a mortgage are underwater.
Below is a list of the larger counties in the St Louis MSA and the percentage of the mortgages in the respective county that was underwater during the 4th quarter of 2022:
According to data released by ATTOM Data Research, during the fourth quarter of 2022, 35.7% of the homeowners with a mortgage within the 63118 zip code, were seriously underwater on their mortgage, meaning their mortgage balance exceeds the value of their home by 25% or more. The table below shows the 10 St Louis zip codes with the highest percentage of seriously underwater mortgages. Half of zip codes on the list are located within the City of St Louis and the other half are located in North St Louis County.
Also shown on the table is the percentage of homeowners with an equity-rich mortgage, meaning their loan balance is 50% or less of the current home value. Six of the 10 zip codes on the list have a higher percentage of equity-rich mortgages than that of seriously underwater mortgages.
There were 4,486* building permits issued for new single-family homes in the St Louis area during the 12-month period ended August 31, 2022, a decrease of 8.93% from the same period a year ago when there were 4,926 permits issued, according to the latest data from the Home Builders Association of St. Louis & Eastern Missouri (St Louis HBA). Six of the seven counties covered in the report saw a decrease in building permits from the same period a year ago with four of the counties haveing a double digit decline.
*The city of St Louis did not report building permit data for August 2022. Last year there were 54 permits issued in August, if we assume the same number for this year, the City of St Louis would of had an increase of 5.6% for the period, and the overall drop in building permits for the St Louis area would have been 7.8% rather than the 8.93% shown…
There were 4,851 building permits issued for new single-family homes in the St Louis area during the 12-month period ended November 30, 2021, an increase of 3.17% from the same period a year ago when there were 4,702 permits issued, according to the latest data from the Home Builders Association of St. Louis & Eastern Missouri (St Louis HBA). Three of the seven counties covered in the report saw an increase in building permits from the same period a year ago, two of those, Franklin County and the City of St Louis, a double-digit increase.
For the past couple of years now you’ve heard how low the inventory of homes for sale is, and, if you are a buyer, you have no doubt experienced some grief or hardship in buying a home as a result. However, this may be changing. As the table below shows, there are currently 3,565 active listings in the St Louis 5-county core market (city of St Louis and counties of St Louis, St Charles, Jefferson and Franklin) which based upon the rate of home sales, works out to a supply of 1.41 months. This is a 50% increase from the supply (inventory) from June of 0.94 months. Granted, at 1.41 months, it is still VERY LOW from a historical perspective, but this is something to watch as it could be indicative of a change in the market.
What do the leading indicators show?
We don’t want to base too much on just one report for one month so to drill down a little further lets look at the STL Trends Reports, available exclusively from MORE, REALTORS®. Below the table is the New Listings Trends Report which shows for the most recent week reported, new listings were up 23% from the same period a year ago. There were 885 new listings in the St Louis 5-county core market during the week 7/18/21 – 7/24/21 as compared with 718 new listings for the same period last year. On the other side of the deal, so to speak, as the New Contracts Trends Reportshows, there were 890 new contracts written during that same week, a decline of 1% from the same period the year before.
Don’t sound the alarm yet..
As I’ve said, even with the increase in inventory it is still low and the trend reports are just for one week so we need to give it more time and watch the trend in the coming couple of weeks before we can determine that there is possibly a significant trend indicating a change in the market. Stay tuned…
In spite of having been in a low-inventory market for the past few years, home sales in St Louis have continued strong. In fact, as the home sales trend chart below, exclusively available from MORE, REALTORS®, shows home sales trend for the 12-month period ending February 28th was at the highest level in over 10-years.
The chart includes the St Louis 5-County core market (the city of St Louis and the counties of St Louis, St Charles, Franklin, and Jefferson) and shows that for the 12-month period ending last month there were 28,571 homes sold (distressed home sales have been excluded). This is slightly above the 12-month period ending the month before when there were 28,492 homes sold.
It’s no secret that listings of homes for sale in St Louis are in short supply and for a while now new sales have outpaced new listings making it a challenge for home buyers. However, over the past couple of months, new sales of homes in St Louis County have outpaced new listings by a greater margin than neighboring counties. As can be compiled from the tables below, new sales of homes in the St Louis 5-County Core market during the last four months outpaced new listings during the same period by 12.7%. For St Louis county, there were 6,095 new contracts written during the last 4 months and 5,353 new listings resulting in new contracts outpacing new listings by 13.9%, a rate 1.2% higher than the rate for the 5-county area as a whole. Franklin County had the next highest rate at 10.7%, then Jefferson County at 9.4%, St Charles County at 5.8%, and then the city of St Louis was the only county where new contracts were about equal to new listings.
During the second quarter of 2020, 45.5% of the homeowners with a mortgage within the 63115 zip code, were underwater on their mortgage, meaning they were in a negative-equity position, according to data just released by ATTOM Data Research. As the table below shows, the north county zip codes of 63137 and 63136 were not far behind at 45.1% and 41.3%, respectively. Of the 10 St Louis-area zip codes with the highest rate of underwater homeowners, 7 were in St Louis County and 3 in the City of St Louis.
The average residential listing in the 63362 zip code area in Lincoln County, Missouri has been on the market for just 15 days, making 63362 the fastest-selling zip code within the St Louis MSA at this time. As our table below shows, Lincoln County zips occupy two of the top spots with the 63379 zip code area in a three-way tie for 3rd on the list with listing having an average time on the market of 25 days. So what’s up with Lincoln County? Maybe with all this social-distancing going on people have decided to head to more sparsely populated areas making it easier, or perhaps have discovered they can move farther out and work remotely?
I’m not saying there aren’t other, non Covid-19 reasons, to move to Lincoln County such as the county seat for Lincoln County, Troy, Missouri. Troy’s popularity has grown substantially with its population increasing about 28% in the past decade from 10,640 people ion 2010 to 13,600 currently while, during the same period, for example, the city of St Louis’ population declined 8% from 319,320 to 293,792.
Maybe it’s the gorgeous weather, a more optimistic outlook after receiving stimulus payments or perhaps just being tired of waiting in limbo, but homebuyers have come out strong in St Louis during the past week! St Louis home sales are still not at the levels we would expect at this time of year but, as my table below shows, for the St Louis MSA as a whole, the most recent 7-day period is down just 16% from the same time last year. This is about half the decline I’ve seen when pulling the data as recently as a week ago.
St Charles County home sales have come back the strongest with 185 homes sold during the 7-day period from 4/14 through 4/21, just 12% less than the same period last year and the city of St Louis is next with a decline of just 14%. Franklin County is struggling the most with just about half as many home sales as last year.
As I wrote yesterday, with low-interest rates and the buying opportunities out there, now is a great time to buy for those that are able. Wow, now that I think about it, maybe that’s the reason home sales are increasing, people are listening to me LOL.
[xyz-ips snippet=”Homes-For-Sale”]
St Louis New Residential Home Sales April 14 – 21 – (Table)
Date Source: MARIS – Copyright 2020 St Louis Real Estate News, all rights reserved
St Louis sellers appear to remain pretty confident in the St Louis real estate market in spite of the COVID-19 threat as evidenced by the number of new residential listings that hit the St Louis market in the past 7 days. During the past 7 days, there were 701 new residential listings on the St Louis 5-County Core Market (city of St Louis and counties of St Louis, St Charles, Jefferson and Franklin) this is a decline of just 25% from the same period last year when there were 943 listings. For the St Louis MSA, there were 930 new residential listings during the past 7 days also a decline of 25% from the same period last year when there were 1,253 new listings.
While the way in which we do business is changing somewhat, such as relying more on technology with things like virtual open houses, virtual showings as well as utilizing resources like Zoom Meetings, Skype and Facetime in lieu of in-person meetings, there are still homeowners that want to sell and buyers that want to buy.
Of the 4,531 residential properties located within the 63113 zip code in the City of St Louis, over 18 percent of them are vacant (824), according to a report just released today by Attom Data Solutions. As the table below shows, six of the ten zip codes in the St Louis MSA with the highest rate of vacant property are located within the City of St Louis and the remaining 4 in St Louis County.
Nine of the 10 zip codes with the highest rate of vacancy have double-digit vacancy rates. Franklin County has the most zip codes with no vacancies at 5, followed by St Charles County with 4.
The foreclosure rate for the St Louis MSA during October decreased 6.0 percent from the month and was down 4.2% from November 2018, according to data just released from ATTOM Data Solutions. As the table below shows, there were, like last month, some mixed results. For example, St Charles County saw a 20% increase in foreclosures from the month before while the City of St Louis saw a 27% decrease from the month before. The U.S. as a whole saw a bigger decline in foreclosure activity than the St Louis MSA did.
As the table below shows, from MORE, REALTORS® exclusive STL Market Report, the overall St Louis MSA housing market has a current supply of homes for sale equal to just a little over two-and-a-half months making it very much favor sellers. The St Louis 5-County Core market (city of St Louis and counties of St Louis, St Charles, Jefferson and Franklin) have, as the second table shows, an even lower supply of homes for sale with a 2.32 month supply.
However, as the list at the bottom shows, there are some municipalities within the St Louis area that are buyers markets, 12 in total to be exact. A healthy inventory, one that is considered “balanced” and not favoring buyers or sellers, is generally 5 or 6 months, so to make this list of buyers markets there must be greater than a 6-month supply of home currently for sale. At the top of the list is Pine Lawn a small municipality in northern St Louis county, followed by Swansea IL and then Town and Country. Town and Country with 4 homes sold in the past month and 54 active listings currently has a 13.5 month supply of homes for sale.
The foreclosure rate for the St Louis MSA during October increased 11.3 percent from the month before however, it was still nearly 25 percent (24.5%) lower than October 2018, according to data just released from ATTOM Data Solutions. As the table below shows, there were some real mixed results this month. For example, St Charles County saw a 150% increase in foreclosures from the month before increasing from 10 in September to 25 in October but is down over 60% from October 2018. The city of St Louis is the only county of significant size in the St Louis MSA that saw both an increase in foreclosures from the month before (65.8^) as well as an increase from a year ago (43.2%).
The question in my headline is one of those questions that in the real estate community, and with most homeowners, would elicit a response something like “the quality of the school district has a major impact on the housing market, duh!”. While I don’t think anyone would argue that having quality public education available to everyone in all areas is important, I’m just talking data here and looking at it from the real estate perspective. So, with that in mind, I decided to use one of the reports produced by proprietary software created by MORE, REALTORS® and based upon MLS home sales and price data, to compare home prices and sales in two of the best St Louis area public school districts to two of the worst (at least according to many lists of best and worst schools out there) to see how they compare.
For two of the best districts, I chose Clayton and Kirkwood and for two fo the worst, I chose Riverview Gardens and the City of St Louis. The results were interesting and, somewhat surprising perhaps. The reports below have all the data, but here is a summary of the comparison:
Home sales for the most recent 12-month period vs the prior 12-month period were up slightly (0.20%) in Riverview/St Louis districts and were down 15.66% for Clayton/Kirkwood.
Home prices for the same period increased by 5.36% in Riverview/St Louis and by 2.41% for Clayton/Kirkwood
Listing inventory for Riverview/St Louis districts is at 2.31 months and for Clayton/Kirkwood is at 2.49 months.
By the way, if you would like to see reports like this for any St Louis area school district, county, zip or city, contact me and I’ll be happy to send it to you.
There are 100,478 residential properties in the City of St Louis, 7,604 of which (7.6%), are vacant properties according to the vacancy rate report for the 3rd quarter of 2019 by ATTOM Data Research. The other St Louis area county with a vacancy rate higher than the rate for the St Louis MSA as a whole of 2.9% is St Louis County where 3.1% of the residential properties are vacant.
St Louis MSA Vacant Property And Investor Owned Property Q3 2019
There are 64,645 residential properties in Franklin County, 32,625 of which (50.5%), are investment properties according to the vacancy rate report for the 3rd quarter of 2019 by ATTOM Data Research. The other St Louis area county with a percentage of investment properties higher than the rate for the St Louis MSA as a whole of 23.8% is the city of St Louis where 41.5% of the residential properties are investor-owned.
St Louis MSA Vacant Property And Investor Owned Property Q3 2019
For the 12-month period ended May 31, 2019, there were building permits issued for 300 new homes in Jefferson County, a decline of nearly 26% from the prior 12-month period according to the latest data from the Home Builders Association of St. Louis & Eastern Missouri. For the same period, there were permits issued for 758 new homes in St Louis County,a decline of 23.50% from the prior 12-month period.
Warren County saw a double-digit percentage increase in building permits again this period, and the City of St Louis again had an increase.
Home affordability declined in the City of St Louis from a 98 on the affordability index in the first quarter to an index of 73 this quarter, for a decline of 25% in home affordability in the City of St Louis, according to the latest data from ATTOM Data Research. In neighboring St Louis County, the affordability was 116 in the first quarter and 89 the 2nd quarter, for a decline of 23%. On the affordability index, anything under 100 indicates homes are less affordable than the historical average and anything over 100 indicates homes are more affordable than the historical average.
Homes became more affordable in Jefferson County and Madison County, IL. during the 2nd quarter. As the table below shows, Jefferson County improved from an already good 105 on the affordability index for the 1st quarter to 108 during the 2nd quarter and Madison County, IL from 103 to 106.
The affordability index takes into account the median home price for the county as well as the median wages for the county, computing what percentage of wages it takes for people in that county to buy a home. In spite of the decrease in affordability in the City of St Louis, it still takes the small percentage of wages (21.7%) to buy a home there. The national average is 33.9%.
Home prices are outpacing wages in 4 of the 7 counties covered…
The strong St Louis housing market, as well as the strong economy, continues to help improve mortgage delinquency rates and foreclosure rates in St Louis. The rate of foreclosure in St Louis in April was 1 foreclosure filing for every 2,167 housing units, a decline of 17.4% from the month before when the rate was 1 in every 1,865 housing units, according to the latest data from ATTOM Data Solutions. The April St Louis foreclosure rate was down 17.9% from the year before.
As the table below shows, over half the counties in the St Louis MSA saw an increase in foreclosure activity in April from the month before, all in the double-digits, however, with the exception of the city of St Louis, all of the larger counties saw a decline from the month before.
For the 12-month period ended March 31, 2019, there were building permits issued for 748 new homes in St Louis County,a decline of 23.60% from the prior 12-month period, according to the latest data from the St Louis HBA. As the table below shows, St Charles County saw a decline of 11.23% during the same period. Last month, those were the only two counties showing a downward trend, but, this month, Franklin County and the City of St Louis have also seen new home construction trend downward. Warren County again showed the greatest upward trend in new home construction with an increase of 23.66% in building permits during the most recent 12-month period from the prior 12-month period.
During the first quarter of this year, homebuyers in the City of St Louis needed to spend a median of just 16.9% of their annual wages to buy a median-priced home, according to data just released by ATTOM Data Services. This makes the City of St Louis the most affordable county to buy a home in the St Louis area. As the table below shows, St Charles County, where it takes 37.7% of annual wages to buy a median-priced home is the least affordable county for 1st quarter 2019.
On a positive note, St Charles County had an affordability index of 101 for the quarter, meaning that homes were slightly more affordable there than the historic average. St Clair County had the best affordability index at 103 and the City of St Louis had the worst at 93.
Since the announcement of the Better Togetherplans to merge the County and City of St Louis together into one big “Metro City”, there has been a lot of talk about the impact this would have on the St Louis real estate market. I’ve had several conversations with people in the real estate industry that feel St Charles County, as well as some of the other surrounding counties, will benefit if the Better Together plan succeeds. Their optimism is based upon the belief that, given what appears to be a tremendous groundswell of opposition to the plan from residents of both St Louis City and St Louis County, that, if it passes, many will flee the new Metro City.
Obviously, only time will tell as to whether the Better Together Plan will even get the required number of signatures on the petition, if so, then whether the voters pass it. It is only then, in the subsequent months and years afterward that we will really be able to see just what impact, favorably or negatively, it has on the St Louis real estate market. For now, however, it seemed a good time to take a look at the St Charles County and St Louis County real estate markets and compare them.
At the end of last month, Better Together, a not-for-profit group aimed at combining St Louis City and St Louis County into one big “Metro City”, released their plan for doing so. To say this is a hot topic among residents of those two areas would be an understatement.
Proponents of the plan say it will make St Louis the 9th largest city in the U.S., will streamline government, dilute the city crime stats making them appear to be better and, in the end, lead to increased economic development and growth for the region.
Opponents, such as the Municipal League of Metro St Louis argue that their (Better Together) plan is unconstitutional (hence why the Missouri Constitution must be changed to permit it) and that “the great divorce”, the label applied to when the city of St Louis separated from St Louis County back in 1876 was done using the Board of Freeholders, so if the two want to get back together, the same approach should be done to accomplish it (Board of Freeholders). Additionally, the opponents argue that allowing the entire state to decide the fate of the people of these two counties is wrong, that historic cities (such as Florissant and Kirkwood) will be disbanded and, in the end, the underlying problems that hinder growth here won’t’ really be addressed.
The proceeding is, of course, my very brief synopsis of the two views as I see them so I would suggest you research the matter for yourself and have included some resources below to do just that.
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