Wealthy New York residents are fleeing the Empire State and moving to a popular Florida town where home prices are continuing to soar.
Scores of New Yorkers opted to move away from the Northeast over the years and settle in Palm Beach, Florida, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Palm Beach property demand has grown over time, and it’s caused a median property price hike and a market inventory drop.
‘Palm Beach saw a massive uptick in housing demand during the pandemic, which drove home prices higher and inventory levels lower,’ Realtor.com senior data analyst Hannah Jones told the website.
Regarding the changes in Palm Beach, Miami-based real estate agent Ana Bozovic called the town a ‘wealth migration for New York City.’
‘Despite improvement, home prices remain well above pre-pandemic levels in Palm Beach as the effects of pandemic-era demand persist,’ Jones revealed.
In the years following the pandemic, its median home price and median listing price now sit at $4.3 million and $2.9 million respectively, according to Realtor.com.
It is also a buyer’s market, meaning the supply of properties is higher than demand.
Wealthy New York residents have been feeling The Big Apple and moving to Palm Beach, Florida
A social media user and real estate experts pointed out that property prices in Palm Beach are rising
Back in 2019, 6.5 percent of New York residents were looking at Palm Beach properties.
For wealthy New Yorkers looking to relocate during Covid-19 two years later, Palm Beach became an attractive alternative, and interest in the upscale community only grew after the pandemic ended.
‘What COVID did was it supercharged migration to South, so it accelerated trends that were already in place,’ said Bozovic, adding one in five potential Palm Beach home buyers were from New York in 2023.
‘New York State contributed the most out-of-state demand to listings in Palm Beach County each year, from 2019 through 2024,’ Jones revealed.
New Yorkers also led the way for the highest number of newcomers to Palm Beach County, according to The Palm Beach Post.
According to data from the IRS, those newcomers from Manhattan, New York, all had an income of around $728,000.
Back in 2019, 6.5 percent of New York residents were looking at Palm Beach properties
New York State contributed the most out-of-state demand to listings in Palm Beach County each year, from 2019 through 2024
‘In Palm Beach County in 2024, the median single-family home price was $665,000,’ Boznic explained.
‘In 2019, it was $370,000.’
‘That is an increase of 89 percent,’ adding that it mirrors what she’s noticed in Miami, where the amount of single-family homes in Miami under $500,000 has declined since 2019.
‘It is not possible to build new product at that price point due to land cost and construction cost, so nothing new at prime locations will be delivered to replace things that have been [there] but have appreciated,’ she said.
Bozovic analyzed all data regarding the Palm Beach home prices, and concluded that transactions of luxury home sales rose by a whopping 640 percent.
The expert added that while New Yorkers aren’t the only reason for the price surges, they are ‘an important piece of the puzzle.’
The median home price of a single-family home in Palm Beach County was $665,000 in 2024
Several famous figures have purchased properties in Palm Beach County in the past, including Serena Williams, Howard Stern and Jon Bon Jovi.
However, one of the most famous residences in Palm Beach is Mar-a-Lago – the primary home of President Donald Trump.
Trump and his family relocated from their primary residence at the Trump Tower in New York to the estate and resort in 2019.
Palm Beach is also the home of at least 58 billionaires, including Ken Griffin and Julia Koch, according to The Palm Beach Post.
Like Trump, Fox News host Sean Hannity moved from New York to Palm Beach and purchased two new mansions in the county for $14.9 million and $23.5 million.
One of the sought out areas in Palm Beach by famous figures is Billionaire’s Row, which includes some of the most expensive mansions in the world.
Realtor.com reported that anyone interested in a two-acre vacant lot on Billionaire’s Row can buy it now… for $200 million.
Mar-a-Logo, the primary residence of President Donald Trump, is considered one of the most famous places in Palm Beach, Florida
The staggering vacant lot price came days after William Lauder, the heir to the Estee Lauder cosmetics fortune, sold two oceanfront land parcels for nearly $178 million.
The billionaire’s land parcel sale broke the record for Florida’s residential price record.
He also spent $155 million on a Palm Beach property that once belonged to Rush Limbaugh in 2023.
‘I think that South Florida has now embraced the $100 million price point,’ Bozovic said.
‘It’s become part of the conversation, and I think it’s here to stay.’
‘It’s not going backwards,’ Bozovic said regarding the post-COVID-19 relocation patterns.
‘We’re not going to see a massive net exodus of people back to high-tax states. I believe that this wealth migration to South Florida has only just begun.’
