Orlando, Tampa Among WalletHub’s Top 10 Cities for First-Time Home Buyers
The financial website WalletHub recently dropped an interesting list that may interest potential buyers seeking to become first-time homeowners.
Released July 15, WalletHub’s 2025 Top 10 Cities for First-Time Home Buyers contained six Sunshine State locations, including two where ICI Homes is building new custom Florida homes.
WalletHub ranked top cities for first-time home buyers in 2025
Six Florida cities made the top 10, including Tampa (#3) and Orlando (#8)
Rankings based on affordability, market attractiveness, and quality of life
Tampa noted for strong job market, high home appreciation, and top school system
Orlando ranked second among large cities for first-time buyers
ICI Homes builds in top-ranked cities including Laureate Park in Orlando and Persimmon Park in Tampa
How it was done
Pulling data from federal-government sources, plus residential real estate organizations and the website’s library, WalletHub researchers compared 300 cities of varying sizes using 22 weighted metrics across three categories: affordability, market attractiveness and quality of life.
Metrics ranged from the quality of school systems, to crime rates, to job markets, to weather, and other things that matter to us when we contemplate buying any home.
Researchers graded each metric on a 100-point scale, with 100 representing the best scenario for first-time home buyers. They then calculated each city’s overall score by combining its weighted average across all 22 metrics, using that final score to rank each city.
Top 10 Cities for First-Time Buyers for 2025
No. 1 — Palm Bay, Florida
No. 2 — Boise, Idaho
No. 3 — Tampa, Florida
No. 4 — Surprise, Arizona
No. 5 — Huntsville, Alabama
No. 6 — Gilbert, Arizona
No. 7 — Cape Coral, Florida
No. 8 — Orlando, Florida
No. 9 — Lakeland, Florida
No. 10 — Sunrise, Florida
Why Tampa ranked No. 3 overall
This west central Florida city has been a magnet for new residents and businesses for quite some time. WalletHub researchers noted a lot of new building permits and active resale listings per capita, plus the 13th-most real estate agents, indicative of a busy, competitive housing market.
According to WalletHub’s metrics, Tampa has the 10th-best school system and a strong job market. Its home appreciation is the country’s 12th-highest, per the report, meaning Tampa homes were worth 97 percent more in 2023 than they were in 2017.
In the three categories cited above, Tampa ranked No. 170 in affordability, No 5 in real estate market attractiveness and No. 6 in quality of life.
Best two large cities: Orlando and Tampa
Using the same scores, WalletHub ranked cities according to population size: large (more than 300,000 residents), medium (150,000 to 300,000 residents) and small (fewer than 150,000 residents).
Tampa ranked No. 1 in the large category, followed by Orlando (No. 2) and Jacksonville (No. 7).
ICI Homes in Orlando and Tampa
We’ve built new custom Florida homes all over the state for 45 years, and our versatile single-family homes and townhomes are particularly appealing for first-time buyers.
In Orlando, find our single-family homes of all sizes in the popular Laureate Park neighborhood of Lake Nona. In Tampa, visit us in the Persimmon Park neighborhood of Wiregrass Ranch.
Ready for your new custom Florida home? Talk to ICI Homes here.
Released July 15, WalletHub’s 2025 Top 10 Cities for First-Time Home Buyers contained six Sunshine State locations, including two where ICI Homes is building new custom Florida homes.
