This East Bay city was named the nation's 'worst' market for homebuyers

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Uploaded: 2026-04-14T11:26:59-07:00
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Berkeley - California, California, San Francisco - California, USA, UC Berkeley

BERKELEY, Calif. - An East Bay city known for its history of activism, widely considered the birthplace of the free-speech movement, and placed on the map by a world-renowned university, may be getting attention for another distinction.

A new study has named the city of Berkeley as the nation’s least favorable market for home buyers.

Berkeley landed the worst among the 272 cities analyzed by online consumer news and reviews platform ConsumerAffairs, which looked at key metrics related to affordability, market competitiveness, home size, and livability.

"With a competitive market and affordability crisis, Berkeley, California, is the least favorable market for homebuyers," researchers said.

6 Bay Area cities ranked among 'worst'

Berkeley was one of six Bay Area cities to rank among the 10 least favorable markets for homebuyers. And all 10 were in California.

"While the worst-ranked cities vary somewhat in size and safety metrics, all 10 score at the bottom of the pack for their competition (staggeringly high) and affordability (abysmally low)," Consumer Affairs said.

Santa Clara, which ConsumerAffairs ranked the second-worst overall market for buyers, was also identified as having the #1 most competitive housing market in California and was the second-most competitive nationwide.

Berkeley vs. Santa Clara

What they're saying:

"The biggest difference between Berkeley and Santa Clara comes down to affordability," ConsumerAffairs spokesperson Dayna Edens explained to KTVU in an email, noting the study’s affordability metric takes into account home costs as well as the median household income.

"In Berkeley, a typical three-bedroom home costs about $1.4 million, while the median household income is just over $100,000 - that puts the affordability ratio close to 14-to-1. In Santa Clara, incomes are much higher, around $180,000, which brings that ratio closer to 10-to-1. So even though both markets are expensive, Berkeley is significantly less attainable," Edens shared.

ConsumerAffairs noted what’s striking about Santa Clara is how competitive its housing market is.

"There are fewer homes available relative to the population, and nearly two-thirds (64.5%) of homes are selling above list price — the highest rate in the country," Edens explained, adding, "When inventory is limited and homes regularly sell above asking price, it signals a seller’s market where buyers have fewer choices and often have to stretch their budgets."

After Berkeley and Santa Clara, Sunnyvale ranked the third-worst market for buyers in the ConsumerAffairs analysis.

San Francisco, Oakland, and San Mateo were also among the top 10 worst, alongside Southern California cities.

Dig deeper:

Researchers used data from real estate broker Redfin and property marketplace Zillow to analyze housing market competitiveness, affordability, and home size.

In the fourth metric category of livability, ConsumerAffairs weighed violent and property crime rates as well as public school ratings from data compiled by online platforms Niche and NeighborhoodScout.

ConsumerAffairs identified two Florida cities as the best markets for buyers. Cape Coral came in first and Palm Coast ranked second best. Surprise, Arizona rounded out the top three.

Breakdown of market size

In addition to ranking the cities overall, researchers categorized them into three groups based on population to represent different market sizes.

Both Berkeley, Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, and San Mateo fell into the small markets category, defined as those with 100,000 to 249,999 people.

Midsize markets had 250,000 to 499,999 people. Oakland fell into that category, and was ranked the #1 worst market for buyers for mid-sized markets.

Large markets were defined as those cities with 500,000 or more residents. San Francisco and San Jose took the top two "worst" slots, respectively, for large markets.

When looking at cities of all sizes, California cities actually occupied the top 18 worst markets in the nation, with the Bay Area taking many of the slots.