If you’ve ever wondered how much every home in America is worth combined, the latest Real Estate Analytics report [1] by Zillow will do the math for you.
According to the report, the total value of every home in the United States was expected to reach more than $29.6 trillion in 2016, which is a record high and a 5.7 percent increase from 2015. If that isn’t enough to boggle your mind, the combined value of all homes in the nation is more than the GDP of the United States and China put together.
“So it’s safe to say the United States housing market is pretty darn valuable—worth more than the entire 2015 market capitalization of every U.S. public company combined (roughly $25 trillion),” Zillow Chief Economist Svenja Gudell said, noting that “the national housing market is really just a collection of smaller, local markets. And on their own, the total value of housing in some of America’s priciest places is eye-popping.”
One West Coast city topped the list for its lavish homes. Los Angeles homes, which include celebrity-populated suburbs like Beverly Hills and Malibu, hold the title as America’s most valuable housing market and have a combined total value of more than $2.5 trillion, which is more than double the combined wealth of America’s 50 richest citizens. The Big Apple came in at a close second at less than $2.4 trillion, and is arguably more or less than the GDP of France. The San Francisco Bay area rounds out the top three spots, with a combined housing value of almost $1.3 trillion. The rest of the top ten most valuable metro markets in the U.S. are Washington, D.C., Miami, Chicago, Boston, San Jose, San Diego, and Philadelphia, according to Zillow.
On the renters’ side of the market, Americans spent $479 billion on rental properties, which was $18 billion more than they spent in 2015 and $97 billion more than in 2011 during the recession, Zillow reported.
Not surprisingly, New Yorkers paid the biggest chunk of change by spending $54.6 billion in rent last year, which was $2.4 billion more than they paid in 2015, according to Zillow. Following New York City were residents of Los Angeles and San Francisco, who spent $38.6 billion and $15.8 billion respectively on rent in 2016.
Markets that accumulated more than $10 billion in rent were Chicago ($14.9 billion); Washington, D.C. ($14.4 billion); Miami ($12.3 billion); Dallas ($11.1 billion); Houston ($10.5 billion); and Boston ($10.3 billion).