Great news for new home buyers in Grand Rapids, at least that's what one study from smartasset is claiming.

According to the article Best Cities for First-Time Homebuyers – 2020 Edition from smartasset, Grand Rapids is considered the best city in the nation for first-time homebuyers.

The reason that Grand Rapids was ranked the best in the nation was due to several different factors like: Home Market Favorability, Affordability, Livability, and Employment. Those factors were further broken down into different metrics that were used to score the 185 largest cities in America.  You can read more about their methodology here.

Now, let's look at how Grand Rapids scored in the different metrics.

Grand Rapids has...

  • the 42nd-best price-to-rent ratio (13.96)
  • the 49th-highest five-year home value appreciation (53.52%)
  • a high under-45 homeownership rate (0.25 per 10,000 homes)
  • a low down payment-to-income ratio (0.60)
  • a low housing costs as a percentage of income (20.31%)
  • a low July 2020 unemployment rate (8.7%)

Grand Rapids doesn't rank first in any individual metric that smartasset used, but the combination of factors listed above, along with the fact that "Michigan has the 15th-lowest foreclosure rate, at 0.25 per 10,000 homes", solidified GR as the best in the nation.

5 Best Cities For First-Time Homebuyers

  1. Grand Rapids, MI
  2. Henderson, NV
  3. Virginia Beach, VA
  4. Boise, ID
  5. Fort Wayne, IN

Smartasset listed the top 40 cities in the nation for first-time homebuyers in their study, but Grand Rapids was the only city in Michigan that made the list.  You can check out the rest of the list here.

QUIZ: Just How Michigan Are You?

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