NAR's 2026 report finds no uniform effect on home prices, jobs, or energy costs
The rapid expansion of data centers across the United States is producing divergent outcomes for local housing markets, with no consistent national pattern emerging, according to the 2026 Data Center Impact Report released by the National Association of Realtors (NAR).
Drawing on data from more than 3,200 US counties and a survey of Realtors working in affected markets, NAR found that data center concentration correlates with higher home values and stronger employment growth, but is also tied to steeper utility costs.
The report is direct about the limits of that finding: correlation does not establish causation.
"There is no single data center effect. Instead, the story varies significantly depending on the local market," said NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun.
"The number of data centers alone does not tell us what will happen to home values, jobs or utility costs."
Concentrated in a few markets, absent in most
Data centers are highly concentrated. According to the report, 92% of US counties have no mapped data centers and just 1% have 10 or more.
The densest cluster sits in Northern Virginia, where Loudoun and Prince William counties together account for roughly 19% of all mapped facilities nationwide.
The top 10 counties nationally hold approximately 42% of the total, with Loudoun County alone representing 14%.
The home value gap between markets is significant. The median home value in counties without data centers stands at $174,500.
In counties with 10 or more facilities, that figure reaches $431,750, and those high-concentration markets saw values rise 95% over the past decade, compared with 64% elsewhere.
Median household income runs to approximately $89,000 in those markets, against $64,000 in counties with no data centers, while employment grew 16% from 2014 to 2024, compared with just 2% in counties with none.
NAR is careful to note these counties were already high-income, highly educated technology hubs before the recent infrastructure surge. For brokers, that distinction carries practical weight.
As data centers price home builders off America's land, infrastructure-driven land competition can constrict housing supply regardless of what happens to home values.
A mixed residential picture, and a clearer commercial one
Among Realtors surveyed for the report, 38% said a data center was already in place or in development in their market.
Residential perceptions were divided: 25% saw a positive effect on nearby home values, while 22% saw a negative one.
The commercial reading was more straightforwardly positive, 50% reported increased commercial property values nearby, and 42% reported higher demand for industrial space and land.
Client-level concerns, however, were concrete. Energy costs topped the list at 61% of respondents, with water use cited by 56%.
Residential electricity rates rose 21.4% from 2020 to 2024 in counties with 10 or more data centers, against 15.7% in counties without. That gap is becoming a more routine feature of buyer conversations as more than half of Americans say they oppose data center construction near their home.
"We do not see evidence of weaker housing markets in counties with a large data center presence," Yun added.
"But these are county-level numbers, and they can't tell us what happens to an individual home next to a facility. That's why local knowledge and credible data matter so much right now."
That framing — local knowledge as the operative variable — is one brokers operating in data center-adjacent markets would recognize.
As recent data on new data centers moving into lower-income zip codes suggests, the communities absorbing the next wave of facilities often have fewer civic and legal resources to manage their arrival, making broker-level market intelligence increasingly valuable.
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