Tampa dropped 19 spots in a list of the hottest-market projections published by Zillow.
A hot market, which is also called a buyer’s market, is when buyers have more negotiating power, and a cold market does the opposite, according to housing experts.
In 2024, the real estate marketplace company ranked the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater metropolitan statistical area (MSA) as the 10th hottest housing market among the 50 most populated U.S. metros.
The index created to compare housing markets in major metro areas included several measurements, including local home value growth, speed of sales, homeownership rates and job growth, according to Orphe Divounguy, a senior economist at Zillow.
He said regions that fell in the rankings, like the Tampa metro, are markets where they are forecasting increases in housing inventory.
“Those are markets where Zillow forecasts weaker home value appreciation. Tampa’s housing market is shifting as the rapid price growth seen in previous years has moderated. In December 2024, the typical home value was 2.5% lower than a year ago,” Divounguy said in an emailed response.
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According to Zillow’s 2025 forecast analysis, Salt Lake City is replacing Tampa at the No. 10 spot.
Other cities held their rankings, like Buffalo, which maintained its No. 1 spot, as did Seattle at No. 32. New Orleans remained at 50.
Also backsliding in Zillow’s rankings were Orlando at No. 23 from 9, and Jacksonville at No. 40 from 31. Miami climbed to 15.
Looking at a different dataset, Lei Wedge, an associate professor of finance at the University of South Florida, said several signs show that the housing market in the greater Tampa Bay region isn’t cooling off much.
She said a hot market is typically indicated by a growing number of homes sold and high average closing prices.
“We saw in the last year, actually, both home prices and the sales of the homes were picking up the in Tampa area,” Wedge said.
Data from Hillsborough, Pasco and Pinellas counties show that the number of homes sold increased from 3,650 to 4,165 for the month of December between 2023 and 2024. The median closing price in December, year over year, increased from $382,250 to $385,000, according to screenshots of MLS data, a private database used by real estate professionals.
Wedge said the Federal Reserve’s interest rate cuts in November and December of 2024 could account for the recent upturn in Tampa’s housing market.
She said buyer numbers could pick up again depending on interest rate decisions to come in 2025 and how those might bring down mortgage prices.
Gabriella Paul covers the stories of people living paycheck to paycheck in the greater Tampa Bay region for WUSF. She's also a Report for America corps member. Here’s how you can share your story with her.
