{"id":163573,"date":"2025-08-21T10:44:19","date_gmt":"2025-08-21T10:44:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/163573\/"},"modified":"2025-08-21T10:44:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T10:44:19","slug":"in-jacksonville-new-construction-is-emerging-as-the-more-affordable-path-to-homeownership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/163573\/","title":{"rendered":"In Jacksonville, new construction is emerging as the more affordable path to homeownership"},"content":{"rendered":"

ST. JOHNS, Fla.<\/strong> \u2013 Buying a brand-new home may no longer mean paying a big premium.<\/p>\n

A new report from Realtor.com<\/a> shows the price gap between new construction and existing homes has fallen to a record low, and Jacksonville is among the metro areas seeing some of the steepest declines in new-home list prices.<\/p>\n

Phil Wade admits he wasn\u2019t initially interested in new construction.<\/p>\n

\u201cOriginally, I was looking for something that was existing, that may have some of the bones that I want, that I could enhance,\u201d Wade said.<\/p>\n

But once he started comparing prices and incentives, he said it only made sense to make the switch.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of incentives are offered by large builders. They can buy down interest rates, they can do things to really make your dollars go a long way in today\u2019s day and age,\u201d Wade said. \u201cThat really made it hard to say no to new construction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since 2016, Realtor.com has tracked the \u201cprice premium\u201d for new homes, which is the gap between median list prices for new builds compared to existing homes. In the second quarter of this year, that premium dropped to 7.8%, the lowest on record.<\/p>\n

Builders are keeping prices steady while existing-home prices continue to climb. Incentives like mortgage rate buydowns also mean buyers may pay a lot less for a brand-new house compared to resale homes of similar size.<\/p>\n

What’s the Deal?<\/p>\n

Check out our weekly newsletter compiled by Consumer Investigative Reporter Tiffany Salameh.<\/p>\n

Local realtor Shauna Clark said affordability is often less about the sticker price and more about the monthly payment.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, so many buyers are payment-focused,\u201d Clark said. \u201cEven a 1% drop in the interest rate can be a game changer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clark explained that some builders have been able to lower rates into the 3% range for qualified buyers.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can get a [new construction] home for $300,000 and pay around $2,000 a month,\u201d she said. \u201cOn the resale side, that same monthly payment could cost closer to $3,000.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jacksonville ranks among the top five metro areas for new-build price declines, with list prices down about 8% year over year in the second quarter, according to the report.<\/p>\n

Analysts say the drops are being driven by a combination of high mortgage rates, weaker buyer demand, and builder strategies to deliver more affordable options.<\/p>\n

Wade\u2019s advice to anyone in the market: don\u2019t overlook new construction. He estimates his savings are close to $40,000.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you don\u2019t look at new construction, you\u2019ve left something on the table,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ST. JOHNS, Fla. \u2013 Buying a brand-new home may no longer mean paying a big premium. A new…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":163574,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[29397,852,5229,2436,3188,723,7310,6459,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-163573","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-addressing-affordability","9":"tag-affordable-housing","10":"tag-america","11":"tag-consumer","12":"tag-fl","13":"tag-florida","14":"tag-jacksonville","15":"tag-money","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-united-states-of-america","18":"tag-unitedstates","19":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","20":"tag-us","21":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115066350115501976","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163573","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163573"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163573\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/163574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}