Nashville, TN is the 5th most affordable city in America, according to a Forbes study released last week.
The financial magazine looked at cost of living (where Nashville ranked 3rd among cities with at least 100,000 residents), unemployment (Nashville ranked 23rd) and housing costs as a percentage of household income (Nashville ranked 11th).
The Forbes study surveyed all cities with MSA populations greater than 100,000. I usually hate polls like this because they seem to lack more than one aggregate fact, but when I Wikied the number of cities with a metropolitan statistical area greater than one hundred thousand, I found 342 and became a slight bit more optimistic for the future of Nashville.
Top Ten Most Affordable Cities in the United States
1) Oklahoma City: Cost of Living #12, Unemployment #4, Housing cost #2
2) Pittsburgh, PA: Cost of Living #6, Unemployment #15, Housing cost #1
3) Buffalo, NY: Cost of Living #16, Unemployment #9, Housing cost #3
4) Rochester, NY: Cost of Living #25, Unemployment #1, Housing cost #8
5) Nashville, TN: Cost of Living #3, Unemployment #23, Housing cost #11
6) San Antonio, TX: Cost of Living #19, Unemployment #9, Housing cost #10
7) Houston, TX: Cost of Living #7, Unemployment #22, Housing cost #13
8 ) Louisville, KY: Cost of Living #2, Unemployment #37, Housing cost #4
9) Birmingham, AL: Cost of Living #4, Unemployment #26, Housing cost #14
10) Austin, TX: Cost of Living #15, Unemployment #6, Housing cost #25
Does this Affect Nashville Real Estate Values?
I have long debated both myself and others on whether or not these overnight polls and studies truly possess any predictive value and I have come to one singular conclusion. By themselves, no. No matter the source. In aggregate, yes, especially when a mass public media collectively grabs hold of the headline and incessantly beat it in our subconscious. In the case of this Forbes study, that was not its fate, but I post here on my blog as a curiosity, and perhaps, a beginning of a trend.
