Forest Hills Is The Best Queens Area For Young Home Buyers: Study

FOREST HILLS, QUEENS — Forest Hills is the most accessible neighborhood in Queens for first-time home buyers, and among the city's top-two most affordable areas to look for a first home overall, a new study shows.

The study, by the real estate website StreetEasy, defined "affordable" homes as those listings that people could buy if they earn the city's median annual income of $70,406, and save 10 percent of their gross income for 10 years. By these metrics, affordable homes in NYC cost a median of $352,780, factoring in a 20 percent down payment and other maintenance fees, according to the study.

While most neighborhoods in the city unsurprisingly fall far beyond the bounds of affordability — it would take a median-income earner saving 10 percent of their income 27 years to afford the median-price NYC home, which comes with a $949,000 price tag on average — Forest Hills landed second on the top-10 affordable ranking, based on area listings between June and August 2021.

Queens topped the list in terms of its number of affordable neighborhoods for first-time buyers, with four neighborhoods on the list compared to Brooklyn's three, Manhattan's two, and one in the Bronx. No neighborhoods in Staten Island made the cut, according to StreetEasy.

Alongside Forest Hills, Rego Park came in number eight on the ranking and Jackson Heights placed number four — all neighborhoods that have been on the list before.

Flushing however, came in at number eight, marking the first time that the neighborhood cracked the list — one of just two new additions since the website last studied the topic in 2019.

The affordability of Forest Hills mirrors its growing popularity as New Yorkers moved from more densely populated areas in the city into single-family homes in the outer boroughs amid the pandemic.

Here's the full StreetEasy list of affordable neighborhoods for first-time buyers:

1. Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn
2. Forest Hills, Queens
3. Riverdale, Bronx
4. Jackson Heights, Queens
5. Midtown East, Manhattan
6. Upper East Side, Manhattan (new this year)
7. Bay Ridge, Brooklyn
8. Flushing, Queens (new this year)
9. Rego Park, Queens
10. Midwood, Brooklyn

Read more about the study here.