Since 1975, the U.S. has undergone sweeping changes in every aspect of life, from politics to technology and fashion (remember bell-bottom jeans ?)—and the housing market has been no exception.
A Realtor.com® analysis of 50 years of housing data from the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) found that, perhaps unsurprisingly, home values have risen across all 50 of the nation’s largest metros from 1975 to 2024.
But the differences in gains were striking, revealing a deeply divided housing market split between coastal cities where property values saw inflation-adjusted triple-digit increases and Sun Belt and Rust Belt metros where growth was limited to the single digits.
The reason for this glaring disparity between the housing haves and have-nots comes down to some key trends in modern American economic history, according to Realtor.com senior economist Jake Krimmel.
“In short, the U.S. moved from a manufacturing to a service and information economy and that evolution impacted different places through their labor and housing markets,” explains Krimmel. “Some areas were huge winners from that shift, while some got the short end of the stick.”
The winners were the coasts—but especially tech hubs in the West and financial hubs in the Northeast.
West Coast winners
In that circle of winners, housing markets up and down the West Coast emerged as the uncontested standouts over the last half-century, with San Jose, CA, far ahead of the pack.
From 1975 to 2024, the typical home in the Bay Area hub situated in the heart of Silicon Valley—the epicenter of the global technology revolution—saw its value surge a stunning 396% when adjusted for inflation.
In 2024, which coincided with the AI boom, San Jose became the first U.S. city to see the median price of a single-family home surpass $2 million.
And the metro’s momentum has not stopped: As of September 2025, San Jose stood out as the nation’s most expensive housing market, with the median list price registering at $1.36 million, according to the latest monthly housing market trends report from Realtor.com.
Notably, half of the top 10 metros that experienced the biggest home value increases since 1975 were in California.
San Jose’s bigger, more culturally prominent neighbor, San Francisco, saw the second-biggest half-century property value growth of 300%, followed by Los Angeles at 292%.
Moving up the coast, Seattle—home of Microsoft—notched the fourth-biggest value gain of the last 50 years, at 280%.
“The West Coast markets like the Bay Area and Seattle became huge tech hubs thanks to universities, R&D, and key companies that began shaping the information technology world going back to the ’80s,” says Krimmel.
East Coast standouts
Not to be outdone, traditional old-money hubs in the Northeast also saw significant gains in home values through the 1980s, 1990s and into the 2000s, with Boston ranking sixth with 196% inflation-adjusted growth.
New York, the global center of finance, clinched the No. 8 spot, with homes in the Big Apple appreciating 161% since 1975—same as Denver.
Krimmel explains that metros like Boston and New York benefitted from many of the same trends as their West Coast counterparts, as the financial services sector was transformed by modernization and digitization.
“Highly productive and profitable industries grew local job markets and increased real estate values as a result,” explains the economist.
But in places like Boston and New York, limited supply and surging demand also contributed to rising home values.
Krimmel explains that these East Coast metros tended to have restrictive zoning and land use rules, which limited new construction as local job markets boomed.
“So not only did demand for homes in these markets increase, but the supply was not able to keep pace—this pushed prices up even further,” he adds.
For those same reasons, in fall 2025, the Northeast continues to lag behind the other regions in both inventory growth and post-pandemic inventory recovery.
Struggling housing markets
On the other side of the spectrum, metros where factories once powered the U.S. economy have struggled to transform themselves into high-tech powerhouses.
Memphis, TN, fared the worst, with home values in the Bluff City ticking up a mere 2% in a span of 50 years—the smallest increase across the top 50 metros.
Cleveland, a former hub of the steel and iron industries, ended up like Memphis, seeing local home values edged up just 2% during the same time period.
Birmingham, AL, another major iron and steel manufacturing center from a bygone era, saw the third-smallest inflation-adjusted gain in home values between 1975 and 2024, at 9%.
The housing market of Pittburgh—dubbed Steel City for its role at the center of the domestic steel industry at the turn of the last century—fared only marginally better, with home values rising 26%.
“Not only were manufacturing jobs offshored, resulting in job losses and economic plight, but many of these places did not have the capital—financial or human—to reinvent themselves as tech and finance forward hubs,” explains Krimmel.
As of last month, the typical home in Pittsburgh was listed at $254,950, the nation’s lowest median list price, with Cleveland in second place at $259,950.
