Home buyers must confront a host of variables in the best of times, but in recent years buyers have been forced to contend with a real estate market marked by a significant increase in home prices.

Home buyers must confront a host of variables in the best of times, but in recent years buyers have been forced to contend with a real estate market marked by a significant increase in home prices.

According to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, the median home sales price in the third quarter of 2023 was $431,000. That marks a significant increase since the start of 2020, when the median sales price was $329,000.

That 31 percent increase in a little less than four full years can be traced to a host of variables, not the least of which is the global COVID-19 pandemic, which officially earned that designation in early March 2020. But the rise in home prices is not as recent a phenomenon as some may think. In fact, data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis indicates the median home sales price rose by 576 percent between 1980 and the third quarter of 2023. RE244816