Worcester joins San Francisco, Las Vegas and Salt Lake City as housing markets with the highest price increases

Photo/Grant Welker Westminster Place, a new housing development in Holden.

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By Zachary Comeau

The Worcester area is quickly becoming an expensive one in which to buy a home, according to online real estate brokerage Redfin.

The website said the median price for a home in the Worcester metro area was $284,600 in September, an increase of 11.1 percent, or more than $31,000, from September 2017.

That increase is fourth-highest in the country, behind only San Francisco, Las Vegas and Salt Lake City out of 171 metro areas tracked by Redfin.

Along with the price increase in Worcester metro -- which the U.S. Census Bureau defines as Worcester County and Windham County, Conn. -- came a decrease in sales, as just 919 sales were reported in September, a 2.9-percent decrease from the year prior. In the same vein, Worcester recorded a 9-percent decrease in new listings

Despite the increase in Worcester-area prices, the median price of homes in all of Redfin’s tracked areas rose just 2.1 percent in September compared to a year ago.

Home prices in the Boston metro area rose 4.1 percent to $467,000, according to Redfin, and prices in Greater Providence rose by 3.8 percent to $269,900. Greater Hartford, Springfield and other New England metro areas weren’t measured.

Data from other reports shows a lesser increase for Worcester-area prices than Redfin did.

Boston-based real estate data firm The Warren Group reported a Worcester County median price in August for $285,000, just a 1.8-percent increase from August 2017. For the year, prices were up 6.6 percent to $275,000, according to The Warren Group, which has yet to release data for September.