Read this before the numbers.
A price band is not a house. Two properties at the same number, on the same street, can be completely different propositions. One has eight years left on the roof, a raised foundation, and a block where every porch is occupied. The other has the same square footage, the same year built, and forty thousand dollars of work waiting behind the plaster.
Square footage is the least useful number on the listing. What decides value here is condition and block, in that order. Read the figures below as the start of a conversation, not as a menu.
MARKET SNAPSHOT
- ?Sold Listings
- ?Average Sales Price
- ?Average Days on Market
Four price bands, described rather than tabulated.
What buying actually feels like at each level, rather than what the spreadsheet says.
Entry
Under $400,000. This reaches Mid-City, parts of Bayou St. John and Esplanade Ridge, the edges of Uptown, and a good deal of Lake Shore and Lake Vista. You are usually choosing two of three: the block you want, the condition you want, and the space you want. Most people here take the block and do the work over time.
Middle
$400,000 to $750,000. This is where most of this market actually trades, and where the spread is widest. At the bottom of the band you are still buying a project in a good spot. At the top you can have a renovated double near Bayou St. John or a solid Uptown house off the avenue. The difference between $500,000 and $700,000 here is almost entirely condition.
Upper
$750,000 to $1.5 million. The real jump is not size, it is finish and certainty. Work already done and done well, systems already replaced, a block that holds its value through a soft year. What does not change is the house itself. A hundred-and-twenty-year-old structure is still a hundred-and-twenty-year-old structure, and it still wants attention every year.
Top
$1.5 million and above. A thin slice of this city, and it behaves nothing like the rest of it. Few competing properties, buyers who are rarely in a hurry, and long stretches where nothing comes up in the pocket you actually want. Pricing here is closer to art than arithmetic, and the right house can take a year to appear.
The costs that are not the price.
Budget for these before you shop, not after.
Insurance
The biggest surprise for buyers from anywhere else. Homeowners coverage in New Orleans averages around $6,000 a year on $300,000 of dwelling coverage, against roughly $2,600 nationally. Get a real quote on the specific address before you commit to a price.
Flood insurance
A separate policy from homeowners, and your lender will require it if the property sits in a high-risk zone. The figure is driven by elevation, distance from water, and what it would cost to rebuild. FEMA no longer requires an elevation certificate, but getting one can still bring the number down.
Property tax
Residential property here is assessed at ten percent of market value, and the homestead exemption takes the first $75,000 of market value off your primary residence before the millage is applied. The bill is usually lower than newcomers expect. The Orleans Parish Assessor publishes the exact figure for any address.
Maintenance on an old house
Budget one to two percent of the value a year, and expect it to arrive in lumps. Some years it is gutters and paint. Other years it is a slate roof, a pier, or rewiring a room that was never done right the first time.
Closing costs
Plan on roughly five percent of the price, which is higher than most states. On $600,000 that is about $30,000 on top of your down payment. The full breakdown is on the financing and closing costs page.
Want the honest read on your number?