“Houston Leads in Master-Planned Community Sales” was the title of a story Houston Agent magazine ran last week, reporting on a report from John Burns Real Estate Consulting that ranked the top 50 U.S. master-planned communities by net sales. Texas claimed more than any other state with 17 MPCs – and nine were in Houston.
Of the nine MPCs named in John Burns’ rankings, Fort Bend community Riverstone had the most net sales of 2015 with 609 – maintaining it’s place as Texas’ top selling MPC for the third consecutive year – followed by Aliana with 443 and then Cayon Lakes West and Wilwood at Northpointe, which both had 440 net sales.
While Houston has become a national hotbed for MPC building and sales activity, the typically higher-end sub-market is not immune to the problems facing Houston’s local economy, such as stagnant wages, labor shortages, slowing job growth and, of course, the low price of oil. That is why of the nine MPCs featured in the nation’s top 50, only one experienced a positive growth in sales (Cayon Lakes West improved 7 percent year-over-year) while six recorded declines:
- Riverstone; sales were down 15 percent
- Aliana; down 11 percent
- Sienna Plantation; down 1 percent
- Cross Creek Ranch; down 19 percent
- Grand Mission Estates; down 1 percent
- Oakhurst at Kingwood; down 19 percent
Sales and price appreciation is expected to slow throughout 2016, and we can expect those trends to continue spilling over into the MPC market.