Cost of Living In Northville Michigan - So you’re thinking about making the move to Northville, Michigan? With that being said, it begs the question, how affordable is it? How much house can I get with my budget? What is the city like? All your questions answered, right now.
This blog is a direct transcript from the video below. This comes in 3 versions: You are able to watch the video, read the blog for your convenience or listen to the audio experience (which is linked under the video below).
Before I dive into the cost of living in Northville, Michigan. I want to mention a video I made a little while back about some fun things to do in this fine city, along with some cool things about the city that are very much worth knowing, which I will link in the description. And to add a little more context to everything here, my office is located on Main street in downtown Northville, so I am familiar with the area to say the least.
Just to throw a little back story about Northville, Michigan. The city tends to be a little higher scale, with a dense suburban population where the majority own their homes, and the suburbs are nothing less than highly desirable. This city, despite the population growth, has maintained a small-town atmosphere with well-kept Victorian style homes in a wonderful historical district. You truly won’t find any homes in better condition built before the 1930’s than right here in Northville, Michigan.
With a walkable downtown, and award winning schools, to the thriving business community with numerous professional services and Northville’s community center being a popular hub, this city has a unique offering for not only places to go, but things to do as well.
I’ll kick this off by showing you this graph from bestplaces.net that breaks down the cost of living not only in Northville, but Michigan and the United States as well. For those of you that don’t know the drill, the national average is based on a 100 point scale. As you can see (or if you’re listening to the audio version instead of watching, just trust my honesty), the overall cost of living score is 129.8 in Northville. Housing and transportation tend to be the biggest influences on that.
I'll touch on the housing first, taking a look at these few location graphs which show the average sale price over the last 3 years provided by the multiple listing service, since the city and township border Oakland and Wayne county. I wanted to provide this comparison to give you some perspective on how the home values shift a little bit depending on the direction you go.
As you can see, the chunk of Northville in Oakland County has an average sale price of over $469,000, which is a 25.7% increase from a year ago. The chunk of Northville in Wayne County averages a sale price of over $571,000, which is a 26.6% increase from a year ago. And last but not least, Northville twp. in Wayne county (which covers a little more surface area) averages a sale price of over $523,000, which is a 8.8% increase from a year ago.
With all that being said, you can guarantee you’ll be paying a lot more money for a home if you’re within rock throwing distance of downtown in one of the nearby suburbs. The one downside to this is Northville is a little over 2 square miles in size, so all the homes are relatively close to downtown, as it acts as a central hub for the city, but I promise you,, that doesn’t mean there aren’t a huge range of options for any buyer out there.
Just to give you a better idea of how your dollar can fluctuate in Northville, I’ll show you a few houses in the area that are actively listed, sold and pending homes. I’ll also include Northville Twp in this search, as it will tack on another 16.57 square miles of land. Taking a look at the cheaper end of this list, you can see you can get your hands on a 2 bedroom, 1.5 bathroom condo that’s just over 1,000 sq ft located on Jamestown Circle, which is right off of Northville road that turns into Main St after passing 7 mile road. So it’s a very affordable option under $150,000 if you’re looking to be very close to downtown Northville.
Now taking a look at a home slightly above average in Northville off of Whitegate Drive in the wonderful Abbey Knoll Estates subdivision, which is slightly North west of downtown, at a 4 minute driving commute, which isn’t bad at all. This home is listed at $600,000 with 4 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, and over 4,600 square feet, situated on almost half an acre in a quiet Cul-de-sac. So much curb appeal with this home that was beautifully architected back in 1987.
Now taking a look at a home on the top end of this list (actually listed by a co-worker of mine at Sotheby’s Realty). This palatial estate is right on Dubuar Street right near the historic district of Northville, which is a 3 minute drive from downtown. This mansion was once home to the consulate of the Czech Republic, and offers 7 bedrooms, 7 bathrooms, with 2 additional half baths, a 6+ car garage, and over 22,000 finished square feet nestled on 2 private acres, gated at the end of the street. Built in 2000, this home features: a guard house, bank vaults, wine cellars, in-law suite, a theater replicated after the famous New York City Paramount Movie Palace, and endless craftsmanship throughout. Listed at $4.95 million, and is actually currently pending, I can’t brag about this home enough.
Now transitioning over to a few stats about housing. Let’s talk about closed sales. Taking a look at these charts, you can see it’s looking a little sad and uneventful. Of course it’s not just Northville, but it gives you an idea of how the real estate market is. Taking a look at the right side here you can see the negatives and the very limited inventory that has sold in these areas over the past 12 months.
With desirability and the amenities the historic town of Northville offers, it justifies the higher price tag for homes, along with the slim housing inventory on the market. With the few homes I showed you, I bet you wouldn’t want to leave the city either. A lovely small downtown feel, great suburbs, a central location and easy commute to nearby expressways, it really is everything someone would want and more.
Jumping over to transportation as it plays a role in the overall cost of living. This category consists of gas prices, car insurance, maintenance costs, along with registration and licensing. At the time of recording this video at the end of April 2022, The price for regular gas averages $3.932 a gallon, mid-grade $4.273, premium is $4.619 and diesel is $4.901. As far as car insurance, I made a video about the cost of living in Michigan where I breakdown how insurance is structured here, so if that’s a topic that interests you, i’ll throw that video in the description as well.
The next thing I want to touch on is the median household income. According to niche.com, the median national household income is just over $62,000. In Northville it falls just over $114,000. The income per capita is around $64,000, meaning the average income of every resident. The city has earned a letter ranking of an A in terms of employment rates, business growth and job growth.
According to Niche.com the population by occupation in Northville is manufacturing at 19%, professional, scientific and technical services at 14.8%, health care at 11.8%, educational services at 11%, food services at 7.7%, along with finance and insurance at 6.3%. The remaining population trickles out to management, real estate, administration, transportation, and other miscellaneous industries.
That sums up a brief cost of living in Northville, Michigan. How does Northville’s cost of living or even Michigan’s in general compare to yours? Drop your thoughts in the comments below.
MENTIONED VIDEO LINKS:
→Fun Things To Do In Northville Michigan: https://youtu.be/Fi864AckXbA
→Cost of Living In Michigan: https://youtu.be/qWeDltOla58
Cheers,
Andrew
Andrew McManamon is a Michigan REALTOR® with Signature Sotheby’s International Realty and provides real estate services to Buyers, Sellers and Investors throughout SE Michigan including Livingston County, Oakland County, Washtenaw County, Genesee County & beyond. Andrew has become one of the rising stars of Michigan real estate agents. Prior to his real estate career Andrew was responsible for managing a senior living facility in Brighton, Michigan as a dining supervisor and an activities assistant. Andrew’s passion to help people is unlike any other, and he continues to strive to be best resource he can be. Andrew graduated from Cleary University in Howell, Michigan with a double major and currently resides in White Lake, Michigan.