The Cost of a White Christmas
Do you dream of a white Christmas, enjoy winter sports or just love snow? Finding a home in a snowy place shouldn’t be that hard, according to a new study by LendingTree. It showed that 28 of the 50 U.S. states averaged over 20 inches of snowfall a year, and 18 of those averaged at least 36 inches. But what’s the cost of a home in your winter wonderland of choice?
By examining the median home values and incomes in all 50 states, the study showed that homes in the 10 states with the most snowfall had a median value that was $13,000 higher than those in the 10 states with the least snow; not a large difference.
We thought it would be interesting to look at the numbers another way and figure out where you would get the most snow per housing dollar.
Among the 15 states with the most snow, Vermont won out. Its median home value of $235,000, divided by its average annual snowfall of 89.25 inches, resulted in a cost of $2,633 in home dollars per inch of snow. Up next was Maine, where the median home value was lower, at $211,000, but there was less snow too, at 77 inches a year, valuing snow there at $2,730 in home dollars per inch. West Virginia, in ninth place, had the lowest median home value among the top 15, at $130,500, but a considerably deep snowfall of about 25 inches a year, or $5,245 in home dollars per inch of snow. This week’s chart shows the 15 states in which you get the most snow per housing dollar. (Home values were drawn from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 American Community Survey and snowfall data from USA.com, using historical weather station data from 1980 to 2010.)
The flip side is also entertaining. In Florida, which gets an average of just 0.01 inch of snowfall annually, an inch of snow would theoretically cost about $26.15 million in home dollars. But Hawaii broke the calculator; average annual snowfall there is zero, revealing, perhaps, the true value of snow: priceless.
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