Rockdale County Housing Dashboard

We’ve got housing prices on our minds. Again.

Rising housing costs, especially since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, have been well established. Prices for new and older homes alike have been steadily increasing in many parts of the country. Over the past few months, we have published blog posts showcasing dashboards for the following:

This new dashboard for Rockdale County leverages data from the county’s Qpublic public records database which we have collected, geocoded, and aggregated to the Census tract level.

The dashboard (built for desktop, not mobile screens) can be accessed here, and we have included a screenshot of the dashboard below. It features an expandable left-hand side panel with a toggle for the dashboard variable: total sales, median price per square foot, and median overall price. Sidebar sliders allow filtering for transaction time frame, construction vintage of the home, and city/region:

Findings

Here are a few pertinent findings highlighted by the dashboard:

From 2018 to 2023:
- 9,722 homes sold countywide;
- the overall median sales price countywide during this time period was $229,000, while the median price per square foot was $109.
- the median sale price per square foot rose 83.8%, although much of this increase occurred since early 2021.
The peak price per square foot occurred in June 2023, with a countywide median of $161.
- This median has gone largely unchanged from 12 months prior, when the countywide median price per square foot was $155.
Since the onset of the pandemic (i.e., 2020 – present):
- Nearly 6,500 homes have sold countywide;
- the overall median sales price was $255,000;
- the median sale price per square foot was $126 and rose by 56.3% between 2020 and 2023.
Homes sold in just the Conyers sub-geography of Census tracts featured a median vintage of 1988 from 2018 to 2023.
- Comparatively few homes have sold that are of relatively new construction in the Conyers market since the onset of the pandemic.
- Of the homes built since 2000 in the Conyers market (464 in total), 178 have sold north of the downtown in Census tract 13-247-060317.
When toggling on the 3D view of the map, we find that 2 Census tracts in particular show a large amount of market activity (12-247-060315 and 13-247-060406), but neither tract features a high median sales price per square foot – about $125 each.
- Contrast this with the furthest-north Census tract of 13-247-060103, which only features 129 sales since 2020 but with a median sales price of $141.67.
- Also, Census tract 13-247-060311 borders I-20 just south of downtown Conyers and features a median sales price per square foot of around $142 with more robust market activity at 278 transactions during the same timeframe.