Anonymous wrote:Home values / land values went up + material costs went up + labor costs went up + business operations costs for builders (insurance, trucks, lunches) went up.
Land values didn't go up this much over the last few years, but construction costs certainly seem to have gone up a lot. Or it could be that the only construction available in some areas now are huge luxury homes. But even if you want to build a home it's insanely expensive. To build a 4-5K sq.f.t home you need to pay more than the cost of the land in HCOL parts.
It's absolutely inflated and based on location, because there cannot otherwise be such price discrepancy in new construction costs between diff areas.