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These Massachusetts maps show where median home prices have risen (and fallen) the most – The Boston Globe

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These Massachusetts maps show where median home prices have risen (and fallen) the most – The Boston Globe


Home prices have continued to rise across the state over the past five years, but popular destinations for warm beach days have been on a blazing hot streak.

Communities on Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and Nantucket top the list of places where median sale prices for single-family homes have soared the most, according to data from The Warren Group, a real estate information firm. Coastal regions are home to 13 of the 20 towns with the sharpest growth in prices between 2019 and 2024, when looking at places with 50 or more sales in 2024.

Topping the list are Cotuit and Osterville, charming and relatively non-touristy villages within the town of Barnstable. In both villages, the median price of a single-family home more than doubled over the past five years, hitting $907,500 in Cotuit and $1.2 million in Osterville.

Rising prices have hit less high-end coastal towns as well: Dennis, Yarmouth, and the Barnstable villages of Hyannis and Marstons Mills all saw notable increases. In each of those communities, however, the median sale price is still below $700,000, which might even qualify as a bargain in the Cape’s real estate environment.

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On Nantucket, the median home sale came in at more than $2.8 million last year. It’s hard to believe, but prices on the island keep getting more expensive: Nantucket saw an 87.5 percent increase in its median sale price, compared with five years ago.

How did we get here?

The story of coastal Massachusetts real estate exemplifies the recent dynamics of the state as a whole. Prices began their steep ascent during a market frenzy in 2020, when COVID lockdowns prompted people to look for a little room to breathe while they were stuck at home. Mortgage rates below 4 percent helped even a big purchase make financial sense, says Todd Machnik, president of the Cape Cod and Islands Association of Realtors. Then, even when lockdowns loosened, prices remained stubbornly high because of a lack of supply, Machnik says. There is little new housing being built in the region, and interest rates that have been stuck above 6 percent since fall of 2022 have made homeowners reluctant to list their properties and look for others.

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“There was really no way to replenish the inventory,” Machnik says.

Of course, surging prices aren’t limited to the Cape and Islands, as other high increases are spread out across the state. Many of these are towns with lower prices that have gained popularity as buyers seek out affordable options in a market that has flummoxed many would-be homeowners. In rural Athol, the median price was $320,000 last year, up more than 88 percent from five years earlier. Prices in the former factory cities of Lawrence and Springfield, meanwhile, rose nearly 70 percent, landing at medians of $500,000 and $280,000, respectively.

map visualization
What now?

Current conditions suggest high prices aren’t going away. In some Massachusetts places, prices continued to climb sharply last year. Seven towns — from Monson out toward the west to Merrimac in the northeastern corner — saw a bump of over 20 percent between 2023 and 2024. In Medfield, Newburyport, and Norwell, the median home price crossed the $1 million mark for the first time last year.

At the same time, market conditions do not seem to augur widespread price drops. In March, there was only 1.4 months’ worth of housing inventory on sale across the state, according to the Massachusetts Association of Realtors. Anything less than a six-month supply is widely understood to tip the market to sellers’ highly-priced advantage.

For some Massachusetts communities, however, the trend of annual price increases surprisingly reversed in 2024. In 33 communities, the median price fell in 2024 compared with 2023, dropping anywhere from 0.1 percent in Lexington to 12.7 percent in Lynnfield. These declines could be an early signal of a more even future for home prices, says Sarah Gustafson, president of the Massachusetts Association of Realtors. She cautions the variations between towns mean buyers and sellers need to thoroughly familiarize themselves with the individual markets they’re interested in.

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“Prices are starting to stabilize a little bit overall as a state, and that’s a good sign,” she says. “But understanding of the market is going to be very important for people as we are coming into [spring] 2025.”


Sarah Shemkus is a regular contributor to The Globe Magazine. Send comments to magazine@globe.com.





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Massachusetts

4 shot during World Cup watch party in Massachusetts

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4 shot during World Cup watch party in Massachusetts


Four people were shot on Friday night after hundreds had gathered to watch a World Cup match in Massachusetts.

Police said the shooting happened just before midnight on Main Street in Brockton.

Officers said the victims were taken to the hospital.

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Police have not said if there were any arrests.



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Man cited for alleged wrong-way deadly crash

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Man cited for alleged wrong-way deadly crash


BOSTON, (WPRI) — A somerset man has been cited for allegedly causing a deadly wrong-way crash in Boston late Saturday night.

Just before midnight, troopers from the H9 Barracks were called for a report of a multi-vehicle crash on I-93 North before Exit 15A.

A preliminary investigation showed that the driver of a 2004 Cadillac Escalade, identified as 81-year-old Antone Carvalho, of Somerset, entered Route 93 North at Exit 15B and drove southbound in the northbound lanes.

Two vehicles, a Honda Odyssey and an Audi A4, attempted to avoid the Carvalho and crashed into each other.

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Four people in the Honda Odyssey, were taken to a Boston-area hospital for evaluation.

Shortly after the initial crash, police say Carvalho collided head-on with a Chevrolet Cruze.

Carvalho and the other driver were taken to Boston-area hospitals for their injuries

The driver of the Chevrolet Cruze, identified as a man in his 20’s from Haverhill, died from his injuries.

Carvalho will be issued a summons to appear in court at a later date.

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8 Picture-Perfect Main Streets In Massachusetts

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8 Picture-Perfect Main Streets In Massachusetts


Norman Rockwell painted Stockbridge so often that the real Main Street now looks like one of his canvases come to life. That is the trick these Massachusetts towns pull off. A whaling-era cobblestone lane on Nantucket and a Revolutionary common in Concord do the same thing in different accents. Each one packs its best landmarks into a few blocks you can cover on foot. The eight New England streets here all sit under 50,000 residents and earn their reputation the honest way.

Stockbridge

Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

Fewer than 2,000 people live in Stockbridge, yet its Main Street may be the most recognizable in the state. Credit Norman Rockwell, who lived here and painted the view down the street so many times it lodged in the national memory. The white clapboard buildings, the old inns, and the big shade trees are all still right where he left them, and people still use them.

The Red Lion Inn has welcomed guests on this corner since 1773, and its long front porch is the street’s anchor in every sense. A short walk away, the Norman Rockwell Museum holds the largest collection of his work and even his relocated studio. Naumkeag adds a Gilded Age cottage with terraced gardens climbing the hillside. Come December, the town recreates Rockwell’s famous “Main Street at Christmas” scene with vintage cars parked along the curb, which is about as close as a real place gets to stepping into a painting.

Lenox

Downtown street in Lenox, Massachusetts.
Downtown street in Lenox, Massachusetts. Image credit Richard Cavalleri via Shutterstock

Edith Wharton built her dream house just outside Lenox, and the writer’s eye for proportion seems to have rubbed off on the whole town. The center is small enough to park once and walk, with bookshops, cafes, and galleries shoulder to shoulder under the trees. Under 10,000 people live here, and the place wears its Berkshire elegance lightly.

The Mount, Wharton’s 1902 estate, runs as a house museum and public garden and hosts readings and outdoor events all summer. Ventfort Hall, a Jacobean-style mansion built for a sister of J.P. Morgan, fills in more of the Gilded Age story. Just up the road, Tanglewood draws crowds every July and August as the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, so a quiet shopping street can be ten minutes from a world-famous concert lawn. Few towns this size balance that kind of culture against that little traffic.

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Concord

Main Street in the historic town center of Concord, Massachusetts.
Main Street in the historic town center of Concord, Massachusetts.

On April 19, 1775, the shot heard round the world was fired a short walk from where Concord shoppers now buy their morning coffee. That is the strange gift of this town. Its pretty village center sits below 20,000 residents, and its old houses, churches, and civic buildings look calm until you remember what happened among them.

Minute Man National Historical Park preserves the battle road and the fields where colonial militia turned back British regulars. Old North Bridge marks the spot itself, with Daniel Chester French’s Minute Man statue standing guard. Concord also raised more than its share of writers, and Louisa May Alcott’s Orchard House, where she wrote “Little Women,” still opens for tours. Two miles south, Walden Pond holds the woods Thoreau made famous, an easy swim or walk that closes the loop between the town’s history and its quieter ideas.

Marblehead

Marblehead, Massachusetts: Sites of historical homes and buildings in historical downtown district.
Marblehead, Massachusetts: Sites of historical homes and buildings in the historical downtown district. Dee Browning via Shutterstock

The streets in Marblehead’s Old Town were laid out for foot traffic and fishing nets, not cars, so they bend and narrow and dead-end at the water. The town tops 20,000 residents now, but the historic core feels far older and more intimate. Washington Street and the lanes around it run past brick sidewalks and preserved houses, with the harbor flashing into view between rooftops.

The Jeremiah Lee Mansion, a grand Georgian house built in 1768 for the wealthiest merchant in colonial Massachusetts, still keeps its original hand-painted English wallpaper. Old Burial Hill rises above town with weathered colonial gravestones and one of the best harbor views around. Abbot Hall, the brick town hall with the clock tower, houses the original “Spirit of ’76” painting. Walk the waterfront and the reason for the whole town becomes obvious. Marblehead grew up facing the sea, and it never turned away.

Newburyport

Downtown Newburyport, Massachusetts
Downtown Newburyport, Massachusetts. Image credit Heidi Besen via Shutterstock

Federal-era sea captains built their fortunes at the mouth of the Merrimack, and their three-story brick blocks still line the streets of downtown Newburyport. The Main Street feeling here spreads across several streets rather than one. Under 20,000 residents keep the center humming, with shops and restaurants filling old facades right down to the riverbank.

Market Square and State Street form the heart of it, a tight grid of brick that survived a great fire and a wave of 1970s urban renewal to come out the other side intact. The Custom House Maritime Museum, set in a granite 1835 building, tells the port’s seafaring story. Waterfront Park gives you a bench and a view of the boats. A few miles out on Plum Island, the Parker River refuge at Joppa Flats turns the same trip into prime birdwatching, so a downtown afternoon can end with herons instead of storefronts.

Rockport

Rockport, Massachusetts.
Rockport, Massachusetts. Editorial credit: Starmaro / Shutterstock.com.

A plain red fishing shack on a granite pier may be the most painted building in America, and it sits right in Rockport’s harbor. Locals call it Motif No. 1, after an art teacher who got tired of seeing his students paint it. The town runs under 10,000 residents and folds its best parts into a few tight blocks by the water.

Main Street leads to Bearskin Neck, a skinny peninsula crammed with galleries, candy shops, and lobster shacks that ends with the open Atlantic. Front Beach puts sand and water within a short stroll of the shops. The Shalin Liu Performance Center, opened in 2010, built a concert hall with a wall of glass behind the stage, so the ocean becomes the backdrop for a string quartet. You can wander from a storefront to a harbor view to a gallery without ever breaking stride.

Great Barrington

Rustic brick buildings along Railroad Street in the town of Great Barrington, Massachusetts
Rustic brick buildings along Railroad Street in the town of Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Editorial credit: Albert Pego / Shutterstock.com

Great Barrington wired the first downtown in the world lit entirely by alternating current, back in 1886, and the place has kept that forward lean ever since. Under 10,000 residents fill a center that feels genuinely busy, with restaurants, bookstores, and galleries spread along Main Street and Railroad Street. It looks like an old Berkshire town and behaves like a young one.

The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, a restored 1905 theater, books films, concerts, and live broadcasts year-round. The Housatonic River Walk threads a half-mile greenway along the water right behind Main Street, the work of volunteers who spent decades clearing a once-polluted bank. Just outside town, Monument Mountain offers a short climb to a quartzite ridge and a long view over the Housatonic River valley, the same trail Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne hiked together in 1850.

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Nantucket

Main Street in Nantucket, Massachusetts
Main Street in Nantucket, Massachusetts. Image credit Mystic Stock Photography via Shutterstock.

Whaling money built Nantucket’s Main Street, and the cobblestones laid to keep wagon wheels out of the mud are still there to rattle your suitcase. The island stays well under 50,000 year-round residents even at the height of summer. Brick sidewalks, weathered shingles, and window boxes give the downtown the texture of an old port rather than a new outdoor mall.

The Whaling Museum, set in an 1847 candle factory, explains how a small island once lit the lamps of the world, right down to a full sperm whale skeleton. Brant Point Lighthouse marks the harbor entrance and ranks among the most photographed beacons in New England. Straight Wharf keeps the working waterfront within steps of the shops, and the Oldest House, built in 1686, anchors the streetscape in the island’s first century. Every detail down to the gray shingles seems to point back to the same seafaring story.

Massachusetts Main Streets Worth Slowing Down For

What ties these eight together is not a shared look but a shared honesty. Stockbridge and Lenox lean on Berkshire culture, Concord carries the weight of 1775, and Great Barrington keeps reinventing itself. Marblehead, Newburyport, Rockport, and Nantucket all grew up facing salt water and never lost the habit. The best Main Streets here are not stage sets. They are working downtowns that happen to be worth a long, slow look.



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