What does a $1 million home in Fresno and Clovis look like in 2022? Like this tract house
When you think about million-dollar homes in and around Fresno and Clovis, certain images come to mind.
Stately residences along Van Ness Avenue. Custom builds backed against one of the fairways at Fort Washington Country Club. Ranchettes east of town with horse stables and their own bass ponds.
What you don’t picture are tract houses built on 7,700-square foot lots.
Yet here we are.
Recently, an evening stroll took me to a newly constructed subdivision on the outskirts of Clovis named The Ranch at Heritage Grove. It was there, while walking along the Enterprise Canal, that I spotted an architecturally striking model that stood apart from the rest.
I say “architecturally striking” because you don’t see too many symmetrical houses. Facing the street are identical two-story wings (one containing the garage door being the only difference between them) separated by a front courtyard and connected with a decorative railing.
The overall aesthetic is somewhat fortress-like, which is perhaps why Lennar Homes named this model the Sentinel. According to the company’s website, the 4,379-square foot home has five bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms, including a ground-floor suite with its own private entrance.
But it was the “starting price” that almost made my eyeballs pop out of their sockets: $927,990.
As anyone who has either purchased or looked into buying a new home can attest, the upgrades quickly add up. Enough in a few cases to drive the final sales price of this particular Clovis tract home to seven figures.
(This has actually happened, I have it on excellent authority, even though the $1 million price point has not yet been reflected by the county tax assessor or on websites such as Zillow.com.)
Two years of surging real estate
It’s not exactly news that the local real estate market, much like the rest of California, is booming. Between March 2020 and March 2022, the median sales price for residential properties in Fresno and Clovis jumped from $290,000 to $400,000, according to data pulled from the Fresno Multiple Listing Service. Year-over-year appreciation rates during that same period jumped from 5.4% in 2020 to 17.2% in 2021 and 17.6% in 2022.
That’s two straight years of insane growth, no doubt touched off by the COVID-19 pandemic.
While the rise in home values and skyrocketing rents doubtlessly impacts more people at the lower end of the economic spectrum and in much worse ways, it also alters certain assumptions about the upper tier.
Such as what a million-dollar house looks like.
“In Fresno you would never see a tract home to be about a million dollars,” said Danyelle Conner, a real estate agent for London Properties who specializes in the luxury market. “But we’re seeing it now, and they’re selling like hotcakes.”
Indeed. Phase 1 of The Ranch at Heritage Grove completely sold out, even the model homes. (The Sentinel is the largest and most expensive of the four Pinnacle Series designs. Others started at $780,990, $798,990 and $837,990.) Phase 2 is coming soon, according to the company’s website.
Conner pointed out a couple other smaller custom subdivisions about a mile away where homes sold in the $900,000 to $1.2 million range. The difference is that those houses sit on half-acre lots.
The largest lots at The Ranch at Heritage Grove are less than one-fifth of an acre.
Heritage Grove, for those who don’t know, is Clovis’ newest growth area and represents the city’s first expansion north of Shepherd Avenue. The four square miles bounded by Shepherd, Willow, Copper and Sunnyside avenues will someday be home to 30,000 people, according to city planning documents, and by the looks of things property there will be more expensive than the previous “urban villages” of Harlan Ranch and Loma Vista.
‘This is where we’re at now’
What does a million dollars buy in the Fresno metro area nowadays?
A Realtor.com search of single-family homes listed between $900,000 and $1.1 million returned 16 results in Fresno and eight in Clovis (including the mighty Sentinel). From historic homes to custom spreads on multiple acres to cookie-cutter designs within a 5 iron of a golf course, buyers in this price range have a variety to choose from.
According to Conner, 35 homes were sold in Fresno and Clovis over the last six months for between $950,000 and $1.1 million. Those homes spent an average of 31 days on the market and sold at 99% of their list price.
While lower-priced homes (especially those below $400,000) on average are selling even more rapidly and at even higher percentages of list price, the luxury market is just as hot when compared to normal conditions.
Despite rising interest rates for mortgage loans, Conner doesn’t foresee a reversal anytime soon. Unlike the last time property values spiked around here, she doesn’t think we’re sitting atop a bubble.
“This is where we’re at now, and I don’t think it’s going to change,” she said.
Conner has been around Fresno real estate her entire life; her parents, Don and Paula, founded London Properties. Years ago, Conner recalled, when her mother sold a million-dollar home, it was both a rare occasion and an extremely big deal.
Not so much anymore. In that respect, Fresno and Clovis have become more like the rest of California, where even tract houses on small lots fetch seven figures.
Lucky us.
This story was originally published April 22, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
