Top U.S. Cities Where Affluent Home Buyers Can Snag a Deal This Fall

An opportunity could be on the horizon for those who deferred a home purchase in some of the luxury real estate markets that boomed during the pandemic as demand falls.

Among them, the Miami and Naples areas of Florida; urban Honolulu; and Santa Fe, New Mexico, could be among the best luxury markets in the U.S. for buyers this fall, according to data Realtor.com provided to Mansion Global. The data was staked on a combination of falling luxury median price points, which indicate markets that are softening and where buyers could potentially score a deal; a shift in median days on market; and page views, with fewer views indicating less demand.

“We see that these higher-priced markets are seeing falling demand,” said Hannah Jones, senior economic research analyst at Realtor.com . “And so for buyers who do have access to the capital that they could purchase in one of these markets, they may find more flexibility than in some of the markets that are lower priced and are still seeing a ton of competition.”

Read on for where the opportunity lies and advice in those markets from real estate agents on the ground.

Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Pompano Beach, Florida

Buyers who couldn’t get enough of the sandy shores of this trio of South Florida cities during the pandemic have largely backed off, making it the No. 1 destination for luxury buyers this fall.

The luxury median listing price in Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Pompano Beach was down 22% to $2.5 million in the second quarter. Between June 2023 and June 2024, the median days on market for luxury listings rose five days and in the same time page views of luxury properties on Realtor.com fell a whopping 44%.

Mick Duchon, a Miami-based agent with Corcoran, said that some sellers who were stuck in the high-price mindset of 2021 and part of 2022 are starting to come around, meaning there are still properties out there with a listing price ripe for an adjustment. He said it’s an opportunity for people who have been waiting on the sidelines.

Case in point, Duchon was working with a buyer on a penthouse apartment in the South of Fifth neighbourhood in the summer of 2022, when the market had just started to adjust from its pandemic highs. After approaching the seller with a deal and agreeing on it, the buyer decided to wait. undefined undefined “Two years later, we transacted at 15% below that initial contract price,” on the same penthouse with the same buyer and seller, he said.

He added, “If buyers are basing their offers on what has transacted recently, then they should be able to achieve a solid deal.”

Honolulu

Realtor.com found that the median luxury listing price in Honolulu fell nearly 10% to $2.34 million in the second quarter. In June, the median days on market for luxury listings fell 11 days compared to a year ago, while in the same time frame, luxury page views fell 31%, indicating less interest, making Honolulu the No. 2 market for buyers this fall.

Noel Shaw, an agent with Hawai’i Life Real Estate Brokers Forbes Global Properties, said the peak Covid rush to Honolulu has abated somewhat, but other buyers who decided to change their lifestyle and move there as part of their 10-year plan are still trickling in. It’s keeping competition up for those mid-tier luxury listings and makes it imperative to work with an agent who knows the city like the back of their hand. (Shaw grew up in Honolulu, and said the quality of real estate varies block by block.)

“This is an island, the city’s very limited so we still have a limited supply,” she said. “So while there are going to be some great deals within the city, it’s not going to be as easy or obvious as other cities.” undefined undefined The listings luxury buyers should keep an eye out for are the top-tier properties of Japanese sellers, she said. Honolulu is a prestigious second-home market for Asians, Shaw said, but the weakness of the yen right now means that some Japanese owners may choose to sell and convert their funds back to yen. Those prized properties, which are rare in Honolulu because of the constraints on inventory, are the extra sweet spot for luxury buyers looking for top-of-the-line properties these days, she said.

Naples-Marco Island, Florida

The market frenzy has quelled in this Gulf Shore slice of Florida, with the luxury median listing price down 18% to $4 million in the second quarter. The median days on market over the year ending June is the same as the year prior, at 85, but page views on luxury properties are down over 11% in the same time period, bringing the Naples-Marco Island metro into the No. 3 spot. undefined undefined “We’re over the Covid mania, where people came and purchased properties at any price,” said Celine Wells, an agent with Douglas Elliman. “What we’re seeing now is less volume of sales, but very strong sales.”

For potential buyers, “patience is a virtue,” said Chris Wells, Celine’s business partner and husband. Chris added it’s important to have knowledge of the market so you can act quickly when a particularly interesting property comes to market. Most transactions happen in cash, with mortgages brought into the picture post-closing, he said.

He added, “A nice deposit, a quick closing, a cash deal, a short due-diligence period—these are things that help a buyer get the property they desire.”

Mick Duchon, a Miami-based agent with Corcoran, said that some sellers who were stuck in the high-price mindset of 2021.
Pixabay

Santa Fe, New Mexico The Sunbelt and Mountain West experienced huge demand in recent years, and the small in-between market of Santa Fe was not immune to that.

Unlike the other cities on this list, demand is still up there, with luxury page views surging nearly 7% and luxury median days on market falling 33 days, to 86, between June 2023 and June 2024. Prices, however, are trending down, with the luxury median listing price having fallen nearly 14% to $2.98 million from April to June. All together, it makes Santa Fe the fourth-best market for luxury buyers this fall. undefined undefined “People are still wanting to come here. Santa Fe is still very, very desirable,” said Ricky Allen of Sotheby’s International Realty – Santa Fe Brokerage. “They’re coming for the size of the city, the climate, the culture, the lifestyle. … I think it’s a good time to be a buyer.” undefined undefined Allen suggested that buyers see as many properties as possible that check most of their boxes. “You never know what those properties are going to end up selling at,” he added.

(Mansion Global is owned by Dow Jones. Both Dow Jones and Realtor.com are owned by News Corp.)

This article was originally published on Mansion Global.

On a recent morning in Georgetown—Washington, D.C.’s oldest neighborhood—real-estate agent Jamie Peva strode down leafy N Street, brimming with historical tidbits.

Jackie Kennedy once lived on the street, he said. So did Ben Bradlee, former executive editor of the Washington Post, along with a former Miss America and a powerful U.S. Senator. Bradlee’s widow, author Sally Quinn, and Eric Schmidt, former CEO of Google, own stately homes there.

“I’ve seen a picture of Lyndon Johnson coming out of this house,” said Peva, passing a Federal-style brick mansion. “Also, the Beatles went to a lawn party here.”

Peva, a 60-year-old agent with Washington Fine Properties, has sold Georgetown real estate for over three decades, often traversing the neighborhood by bicycle. Of the roughly 2,500 houses in the historic neighborhood, he has been involved in the sale of 460, he estimated. A self-styled historian of the neighborhood, he knows stories behind its houses and their owners going back generations.

With a knack for lively storytelling, he shares his knowledge with some 37,500 Instagram followers, who have made Peva—sporting the bow ties he has worn since boarding school—an unlikely social-media influencer. Many of his followers are locals, and most have no plans to buy or sell real estate—until they do. It is then, according to Peva, that his spirited reels bring him to mind.

“It’s the digital version of a refrigerator magnet,” he said.

After Peva’s first video in November 2023, his eponymous Instagram account sparked a 10% increase in sales volume in the first year, and another 20% the next, he estimated. “It’s been very good for business, there is no question about it,” he said.

But Peva’s posts have also made him a local celebrity. As he walked down N street, the driver of a Mercedes station wagon slowed down to honk and wave. A lady walking a large dark gray dog stopped to ask what he was filming that day (a reel about a Colonial-era bottling plant.) Peva knew the dog from walking his two springers, Jumpy and Peggy-O, in the neighborhood.

“I need to make a video about the pooches of Georgetown,” he mused.

Jamie Peva shooting an upcoming Instagram reel on a historic house on P Street in Georgetown.

A growing number of real-estate agents now use social media to sell, and some have millions of followers with reels featuring ultraluxury pads, selling tips or reality TV-style reports on their daily lives. While Peva posts about his listings—and sometimes those of other agents—he mostly focuses on Georgetown history, local businesses and community events, saying his goal is to benefit both his business and the neighborhood.

“If we don’t find something genuinely interesting and worth sharing, we won’t do it,” said Peva’s daughter, Violet Peva, a New York social-media strategist who films, edits and posts his reels. “We cover many topics, not just real-estate information.”

Peva is originally from Connecticut, but has lived in Georgetown for over 30 years, currently in a cottage-style house with a white picket fence. Over the years, Georgetown has changed. The Georgetown Set, a powerful group of Cold War-era residents whose Sunday-night potluck dinners are said to have swayed U.S. policy, has long faded away. The community is still home to high-profile Washingtonians, including a Republican senator and several cabinet members. But it increasingly also attracts technology and finance executives, according to Peva. He now routinely signs nondisclosure agreements, ensuring privacy for wealthy clients. The shift has made him rethink his marketing approach.

“For years, a big part of our Georgetown business was made up of people who maintained a low profile,” he said. Real-estate agents were similarly low-key. Today, curb appeal is more important, he said, and agents are promoting themselves more. “As this change was underfoot, I was thinking that I needed to evolve myself too,” he said.

A street of colorful row houses in Georgetown.

Though his own social-media use is mostly limited to following sailing accounts, he asked his daughter to help him post his listings online. Violet, now 26, started coming to D.C. once a month to film his reels. After an early video, on a condominium building called the Elliott, her sister Fern called her to report: “Daddy’s blowing up on Instagram,” Violet recalled. The reel got over 50,000 views. The next two each drew over 300,000. Peva’s most popular post ever, with over 838,000 views, was about the Grateful Dead playing in Georgetown. Sometimes, Peva interviews Georgetowners such as Quinn, the author, or Jamie Stachowski, the owner of a local butcher shop.

Peva’s daughter, Violet Peva, shoots, edits and posts his reels.

Peva, who majored in history in college, now spends up to two hours a day on research, usually in the morning while on his stationery bike. Online, he pores over old newspapers or the Library of Congress website, and he has a collection of articles and books—in and out of print—about Georgetown.

Companies often approach Peva for promotional posts, he said, but he turns them down, feeling that followers would lose interest in constant commercials. One exception is a recent paid post on Mount Vernon, the former home of George Washington. Peva wanted to share its history, he said, and didn’t want to lose the opportunity to another Instagrammer.

Anthony Arend, a professor at Georgetown University, has lived in his current home for 19 years without any plans to sell or buy real estate. But he follows Peva and often likes his posts.

Peva at one of his listings, a 1870s house on Prospect Street.

“He is very charismatic, he is energetic, and he obviously knows a lot about the community,” said Arend, who has referred house-hunting friends to Peva.

One of Peva’s biggest deals—the $10.5 million sale of a 19th-century Italianate mansion—came after he made two 2024 reels featuring the property. In March, he sold the longtime O Street home of Tim and Jane Matz for $5.8 million after featuring it on his Instagram. Peva had showed them the home 25 years earlier, with Violet in a baby carrier on his back.

Last year, Kate Watts, 49, a digital consultant, called Peva to sell her late father’s three-bedroom house on Q Street; her husband had seen Peva on Instagram. In an October reel, Peva praised the architecture of the house, designed by modernist Hugh Newell Jacobsen. Halfway through, he mentioned an open house the next day, ending with an upbeat: “Did I also mention this house is for sale? $3.75 million!” The reel got 27,000 views, the open house was packed, and the buyers made an offer at the list price on the same day.

Peva often travels around Georgetown by bicycle.

Top U.S. Cities Where Affluent Home Buyers Can Snag a Deal This Fall

Georgetown agent Jamie Peva blends history and real estate on Instagram, turning local stories into a powerful sales strategy.