Myrtle Beach home and rent prices are skyrocketing. What’s driving the jump?
Rent and home prices are rising in Myrtle Beach at levels that leave experts puzzled, highlighting the area’s need for more affordable housing.
“I’ve been a realtor for a little over 20 years so I’ve seen both sides of the market. I’ve seen a buyer’s market, I’ve seen a sellers market,” said Shari Will, a licensed broker associate in Horry County. “I’ve never seen anything this extreme before.”
What do the numbers say?
Myrtle Beach rent prices have increased at a rate that outpaces the national average. Since April 2020, the average rent price has increased 8.4%, nearly four times the national rate of increase and above South Carolina’s rate, according to the rental market research group Apartment List. The national average rent increased by 2.3% in the last year while South Carolina saw an increase of 4.9%, Apartment List’s report says.
For a two-bedroom apartment, Myrtle Beach renters pay $967 monthly on average, the report says. That’s higher than rent in Detroit by nearly $100, and trails Dallas by $250.
In the last month alone, Myrtle Beach rents have increased 2.2%, putting it on par with Charleston at 1.5% growth and Greenville at 2% growth, according to Apartment List. The national average is a 1.9% increase month-over-month.
“I’m looking at the trend for Myrtle Beach over the past year, there really wasn’t any dip associated with the pandemic,” said Apartment List Housing Economist Chris Salviati. “It falls into that category of places that have seen a little bit of increased demand during the pandemic.”
Homes in the area are in high demand, too, driving prices up and leaving homebuyers scrambling to put in offers as quickly as possible. Single-family homes have increased 8.3% from March 2020 to March 2021, according to the Coastal Carolina Association of Realtors. In March of this year, the average price for a single-family home was $259,900.
COVID-19 ‘remote work revolution’ drives people to Myrtle Beach
Whether renting or buying a home, prices are increasing, but residents could get more bang for their buck if they choose to buy, according to Will. Some of the increase can simply be attributed to the season: prices in Myrtle Beach generally increase as summer approaches. But with the “remote work revolution” driven by the pandemic, vacationers and retirees are now competing with workers seeking out the beach, according Salviati.
The high demand for housing in the area is largely driven by people looking to relocate, said Will, who focuses on relocation since she’s licensed in multiple states. For people used to New York or New Jersey housing prices looking to move out of the Northeast, Myrtle Beach prices can be attractive.
“They’re coming with Northern money, and the landlords down here know it,” Will said.
But what does that mean for locals who already live here? In short, they’re struggling.
“They don’t have that money, their wages have not gone up considerably to match it,” she a.dded.
Will said some of her clients live in the Northeast, but they can’t retire and move to Myrtle Beach just yet. Between lower taxes and “inexpensive” home prices compared to the rest of the country, they decided to buy a home and rent it out. That’s a new group of people making purchases, she said, making the market that much more competitive.
Will jacked-up home prices worsen Horry County’s affordable housing problem?
Part of the problem is the amount of housing available in Myrtle Beach. There’s an influx of people relocating to the area, but not necessarily enough affordable units to house them in.
“Places where you’ve got a strong labor market, a growing local economy and lots of new jobs, you’ve got folks moving in to take those jobs, and those people need places to live, so more housing gets built over the long run,” Salviati said. “Hopefully those things balance out. That’s obviously not always the case.”
The unusual market is causing buyers to take “extreme measures,” Will said, to ensure they get the home they want. Some are foregoing appraisals, and others are offering tens of thousands of dollars over asking price. But the process can be frustrating.
“A house goes on the market and if it’s priced right, it’s gone within hours,” she said.
The latest surge of people relocating to Myrtle Beach comes as the area has been grappling with rapid growth and a severe affordable housing crisis, even before the COVID-19 pandemic. A recent report from the state housing authority found that nearly a quarter of Horry County renters were spending more than half their income on housing costs.
Increasing the stock of affordable housing takes time, and Salviati said it may balance out in the long run, but the short-term solutions are more difficult to come by.
“These are things that really build over time,” he said. “This is really a unique situation where much of this change has just happened over the past year, it’s really quite unprecedented and I think probably caught a lot of folks off guard.”
This story was originally published May 5, 2021 at 6:58 AM.
