Most popular Baltimore-area ZIP codes among homebuyers
You can try to get at housing-market popularity a lot of ways. By one measure, the Baltimore region's most popular ZIP code is Pasadena, 21122.
The Anne Arundel County community is the one that got the most home searches last month on Realtor.com, according to the company that runs the site, Move Inc. No. 2: 21042, the western ZIP code in Ellicott City.
Here's the rest of the top five:
No. 3: 21784, Sykesville (a ZIP code shared by Carroll and Howard counties)
No. 4: 21043, Ellicott City's eastern ZIP code (Howard County)
No. 5: 21146, Severna Park (Anne Arundel County -- near Pasadena)
Does that match up with your sense of what's popular?
Another way to gauge buyer interest is the average length of time the homes in a community have been up for sale, though that's not foolproof (see this blog post for one reason why). Among ZIP codes with at least 20 homes for sale, here are the ones where Realtor.com shows the lowest number of average days on market:
1. 21104, Marriottsville (partially in Carroll, Howard and Baltimore counties) -- 46 days
2. 21163, Woodstock (Howard and Baltimore counties, next to Marriottsville) -- 63 days
3. 21046, Columbia's southeastern ZIP -- 65 days
4. 21111, Monkton (Baltimore and Harford counties) -- 73 days
5. 21042, Ellicott City's western ZIP -- 75 days
Ellicott City is the only community that showed up on both lists. Woodstock, No. 1 for shortest time on market, is 88th on Realtor.com's search ranking.
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Comments
Apparently I out of sync with the rest of the area because I don't think I would like living in any of those zipcodes.
Posted by: Bmore Sara | September 15, 2011 10:39 AM
Sara, you're not out of sync.
Like the fancier goods your great-grandmother would linger over when looking through the Sears Catalogue "dream book" but not actually buy...
the frequency of looking at the most expensive areas is not even remotely close to actual popularity which only really shows itself when the time comes to actually buy.
hth
Posted by: MrRational | September 15, 2011 11:16 AM
Jamie, thanks for the article. In August 2011, the Baltimore MSA as a whole was the No. 20 most searched market on Realtor.com, with a median list price of $241,000. Take a look for more info: http://bit.ly/mRDFeS
Posted by: Jill Kipnis | September 15, 2011 1:38 PM
I don't know about buying there or living there, but 21212 has a nice symmetry.
Posted by: Cheap Jim | September 16, 2011 9:26 AM