Wake Forest is suddenly the suburb everyone is circling on the map. The town, home to roughly 56,000 residents, has jumped to No. 1 on a new national ranking of in‑demand suburbs after a surge in people searching to move there. With a typical home price now sitting just above $500,000, that spike in interest is already changing how locals talk about inventory, pricing and how long a good listing can expect to sit on the market.
The ranking comes from MoveBuddha, which compared “in‑to‑out” moving searches within metro areas to see where demand is building. Wake Forest logged an inbound‑to‑outbound search ratio well above four to one. The site notes that not every search turns into a move, but argues that search behavior is an early tell for where interest is heating up. For its list, MoveBuddha paired its own moving‑search data with Zillow home‑value figures and other publicly available indexes.
Small town, big interest
Wake Forest may read as a small town, but its numbers tell a bigger story. U.S. Census estimates put the population at about 56,764 and the median household income at roughly $120,777, a profile that helps explain the steady pull on professionals and families. Average commute time is close to 31 minutes, which means many buyers can trade up in space while staying within a workable drive of Raleigh’s major job hubs. Those figures come from U.S. Census QuickFacts.
Housing market snapshot
Local reporting has pegged a typical Wake Forest home at just over $508,000, though the exact number shifts depending on which index you read. Zillow’s Home Value Index, for example, put the town’s ZHVI near $504,000 as of Jan. 31, 2026, and some mid‑2025 market reports showed median sold prices topping $520,000. Inventory has climbed from its pandemic low, but the most coveted neighborhoods are still tight enough that standout listings can draw competing offers. For a closer look, see the local story in The News & Observer and market data from Zillow.
What buyers are looking for
Ask newcomers what sold them on Wake Forest and the answers tend to rhyme. The compact red‑brick downtown, lined with restaurants, small shops and breweries, gets a lot of love. So do the schools and the option to spread out a bit without losing access to the Triangle’s jobs and amenities. The town sits a short drive from Raleigh’s core, offering that mix of small‑town feel and big‑metro opportunity that travel editors have been fawning over this year. Travel coverage spotlighting that blend helped push Wake Forest onto national lists this season, including coverage in Travel & Leisure (via Yahoo).
What this means for locals
For sellers, the message is pretty clear: well‑priced homes can still expect solid interest. For buyers, the frenzy has cooled enough from the pandemic peak that there is at least some room to negotiate. Market trackers report more listings staying active longer than they did in 2021 and 2022, suggesting a slow rebalancing instead of a sharp drop in values. Aggregated local market data and broker snapshots are available from sources such as Rocket Homes and Zillow…