Chicago homes with garages sell for an estimated 38% more than comparable homes without them, according to a new analysis from Redfin, adding $46,745 on the sale price of a typical Chicago home, the biggest home price premium of any metro area in the U.S. that meets the criteria for the analysis. Nationwide, homes with garages sell for $23,211 more than homes without garages, which equates to a 12% premium.
The five metros where garages are worth the most—Chicago, St. Louis, Columbus, Oklahoma City and Cleveland—are all located in the Midwest, where winters tend to be cold and snowy. Garages aren't as valuable in places with warmer year-round climates like Honolulu, Los Angeles and Austin.
"In the winter, finding a place to park is even more difficult because more people drive to work when it's cold outside," said Lamar Austin, a Redfin agent in Chicago. "And when you finally do find a parking spot at the end of the day, you usually have to shovel the snow before you can park there. If you have a garage, you may have to shovel snow from the driveway, but at least your car won't get buried overnight."
Table: Home Price Premiums Associated with Having a Garage
| Metro area | Average garage premium (%) | Average garage premium ($) | Share of homes sold in 2018 that have a garage |
| National | 12% | $23,211 | 85.2% |
| Chicago, IL | 38% | $46,745 | 94.1% |
| St. Louis, MO | 35.1% | $34,352 | 70.5% |
| Columbus, OH | 24.2% | $24,154 | 87.1% |
| Oklahoma City, OK | 22.4% | $19,040 | 93.6% |
| Cleveland, OH | 21.6% | $21,285 | 92.8% |
| Memphis, TN | 20.9% | $20,686 | 71.3% |
| Akron, OH | 19.8% | $13,423 | 87.1% |
| Albany, NY | 19.5% | $30,808 | 81.3% |
| Fort Worth, TX | 19.4% | $27,522 | 91.9% |
| Dallas, TX | 17.4% | $28,715 | 92.8% |
| West Palm Beach, FL | 17.3% | $40,636 | 85.5% |
| Lakeland, FL | 16.9% | $21,918 | 87.2% |
| Tampa, FL | 15.5% | $26,886 | 91.1% |
| Fort Lauderdale, FL | 14.6% | $37,543 | 86.2% |
| Orlando, FL | 14.5% | $25,918 | 92.7% |
| Louisville, KY | 13.4% | $17,917 | 74.2% |
| Charlotte, NC | 13.0% | $20,971 | 72.4% |
| Montgomery County, PA | 12.9% | $31,232 | 78.2% |
| Tucson, AZ | 12.6% | $21,091 | 73.6% |
| Tulsa, OK | 12.2% | $9,050 | 93.3% |
| Wilmington, DE | 11.8% | $20,706 | 72.2% |
| Birmingham, AL | 11.8% | $13,145 | 70.1% |
| Fresno, CA | 11.8% | $20,011 | 93.4% |
| Little Rock, AR | 11.5% | $13,297 | 76.2% |
| Hampton Roads, VA | 11.0% | $19,246 | 91.1% |
| Las Vegas, NV | 10.8% | $20,457 | 97.4% |
| Phoenix, AZ | 10.7% | $21,487 | 89.1% |
| Denver, CO | 10.6% | $35,411 | 91.6% |
| Cincinnati, OH | 10.5% | $12,117 | 89.0% |
| Baltimore, MD | 10.4% | $27,065 | 70.3% |
| Providence, RI | 10.3% | $24,487 | 63.1% |
| North Port, FL | 10.0% | $18,958 | 91.8% |
| New York, NY | 9.6% | $41,372 | 86.1% |
| Camden, NJ | 9.3% | $13,779 | 69.8% |
| Sacramento, CA | 8.7% | $26,528 | 93.4% |
| Atlanta, GA | 8.5% | $15,372 | 87.5% |
| Boston, MA | 8.5% | $33,567 | 62.4% |
| Washington, DC | 8.5% | $32,138 | 76.9% |
| Tacoma, WA | 8.4% | $22,589 | 87.5% |
| Houston, TX | 8.3% | $13,696 | 98.2% |
| Nashville, TN | 8.2% | $16,810 | 86.6% |
| Worcester, MA | 7.3% | $16,723 | 69.7% |
| Miami, FL | 7.3% | $21,795 | 82.0% |
| Oakland, CA | 7.0% | $46,336 | 92.0% |
| Long Island, NY | 7.0% | $26,154 | 82.9% |
| Ogden, UT | 7.0% | $14,173 | 82.3% |
| Salt Lake City, UT | 7.0% | $17,794 | 85.1% |
| Portland, OR | 6.6% | $23,274 | 90.9% |
| Riverside, CA | 6.5% | $17,479 | 97.5% |
| Seattle, WA | 6.1% | $31,796 | 85.1% |
| Philadelphia, PA | 6.0% | $13,124 | 63.1% |
| Richmond, VA | 5.8% | $11,282 | 45.5% |
| San Diego, CA | 5.4% | $29,263 | 92.7% |
| Honolulu, HI | 4.1% | $32,250 | 50.6% |
| Los Angeles, CA | 3.5% | $25,978 | 95.7% |
| Austin, TX | 3.2% | $9,522 | 49.6% |
| Raleigh, NC | 2% | $3,961 | 80.7% |
In Austin, a sprawling metro area where snow is very rare, garages are associated with a much lower premium. Garages are also much more common in Chicago than Austin: nearly 95% of homes in the Chicago metro have garages, while less than half of them in the Austin metro do.
"A lot of builders in the inner core of Austin skip garages in favor of adding more livable square space to the house," said local Redfin agent Andrew Vallejo. "Home buyers don't necessarily expect to get a garage if they're buying a home inside the city, though many people do value them, particularly in the suburbs where a two-car garage is the norm."
Redfin compared the sale prices of single-family homes that sold in 2018 with a garage to comparable homes without a garage. The results are reported by metro area in terms of the sale price premium, as a percentage and in dollars, attributed to the presence of a garage. The ranking is limited to metro areas with at least 1,500 homes that met the criteria for this analysis, with at least 500 homes with a garage and 500 homes without.
