Editor’s Note: This is not investment advice, and we are not financial advisers.
Suppose real estate is the most significant investment a majority of people make in their lifetime. In that case, it’s best to understand the places in Maryland with best potential return on investment.
After working in real estate adjacent roles for over a decade, I had the hypothesis that the best place to buy for a return on investment would be up-and-coming cities. Smaller cities where crime might be high now, but people still move to.
To test my hypothesis, we are going to look at places in Maryland that are growing faster than average, but where home prices are below average, and crime rates are higher than average.
In everyday terms, these might be “deals”. The best deal in Maryland at the moment according to Saturday Night Science? That would be Middl.
-1.8% population growth · -3.1% home price growth
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
1.4% population growth · 0.6% home price growth
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
-0.1% population growth · 0.0% home price growth
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
0.8% population growth · -1.9% home price growth
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
1.1% population growth · 2.0% home price growth
Poolesville is a town in the western portion of Montgomery County, Maryland. The population was 4,883 at the 2010 United States Census. It is surrounded by the Montgomery County Agricultural Reserve, and is considered a distant bedroom community for commuters to Washington, D.C.
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
1.8% population growth · -0.7% home price growth
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
0.4% population growth · 1.3% home price growth
Located in
Calvert County, Maryland
Chesapeake Beach is a town in Calvert County, Maryland. Its major attractions include the Chesapeake Beach Railway Station, the Chesapeake Beach Rail Trail, a water park, marinas, piers, and charter boat fishing. The town’s population was recorded as 5,753 in the 2010 census.
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
0.1% population growth · -1.3% home price growth
District Heights is an incorporated city in Prince George’s County, Maryland, located near Maryland Route 4. The population was 5,837 at the 2010 United States Census. For more information, see the separate articles on Forestville, Maryland and Suitland.
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
0.4% population growth · -0.9% home price growth
Located in
Prince George’s County, Maryland
Glenarden is a city in Prince George’s County, Maryland, United States. The population was 6,000 at the 2010 census.
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
1.0% population growth · 0.1% home price growth
Located in
Frederick County, Maryland
Walkersville is a town in Frederick County, Maryland, United States. The population was 5,800 at the 2010 census.
Data | Crime | Cost of living | Movers
The receipts
Compare the top ten
Pick a metric. The bars rescale. The red line is Maryland’s statewide median.
Maryland statewide median: $429,705
On the map
Where Maryland’s best buys are
Saturday Night Science
Methodology: How do you determine the best places to buy a home in Maryland for 2026?
We were in real estate for almost five years and have worked on this site for over a decade. Suffice it to say we’ve put a lot of thought into finding an excellent place to buy a home.
So all that thinking has come to this moment where we get to spell out how we’d approach finding an up-and-coming place to live in Maryland. Put differently, the analysis will try to find places in Maryland with undervalued homes relative to pent-up demand using Saturday Night Science.
To do that, we looked at the most recent American Community Survey Census data for 2020-2024 and compared it to the previous vintage. Specifically, we used the following criteria:
- Y-o-Y Change In Population (People want to live here)
- Y-o-Y Change In Median Home Prices (People are willing to pay for it)
- Home Prices Relative To The State Average (It’s still kinda cheap)
We want places that are growing, have seen home prices increase in recent years, and are still “cheap” for Maryland, with these caveats: home prices had to be within 20% of the state average, home prices increased in the last year, and the city had above 5,000 people.
So of the 508 cities and towns in Maryland, only 44 places made it through our initial filters to even be considered.
We then ranked each place from 1 to 44 for the above criteria, with 1 being the best. We averaged the rankings to create a “best place to buy” index, with the place having the lowest index being the best.
Turns out that Middl is the best potential gem in the not-so-rough in the Old Line State.
The full plate
Best Places To Buy A Home In Maryland
Click any column to sort. Search by city name.
| Rank | City | Population | Median Home Price | Population Change | Home Price Increase |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Middl | 5,014 | $567,755 | -1.8% | -3.1% |
| 2 | Berlin | 5,232 | $440,463 | 1.4% | 0.6% |
| 3 | Manchester | 5,439 | $462,578 | -0.1% | 0.0% |
| 4 | Cheste | 5,594 | $352,032 | 0.8% | -1.9% |
| 5 | Poolesville | 5,764 | $736,648 | 1.1% | 2.0% |
| 6 | Fruitland | 5,801 | $252,664 | 1.8% | -0.7% |
| 7 | Chesapeake Beach | 6,456 | $462,696 | 0.4% | 1.3% |
| 8 | District Heights | 5,891 | $342,105 | 0.1% | -1.3% |
| 9 | Glenarden | 6,344 | $413,332 | 0.4% | -0.9% |
| 10 | Walkersville | 6,414 | $466,394 | 1.0% | 0.1% |
| 11 | Brunswick | 8,450 | $409,509 | 5.7% | 1.1% |
| 12 | Hampstead | 6,251 | $439,359 | -1.0% | 1.3% |
| 13 | Cheverly | 6,096 | $468,344 | -0.2% | -1.6% |
| 14 | Thurmont | 6,254 | $397,682 | -2.9% | -0.1% |
| 15 | Taneytown | 7,932 | $395,402 | 8.7% | -0.3% |
| 16 | Ocean City | 6,903 | $441,288 | 0.2% | 0.2% |
| 17 | Riverdale Park | 7,270 | $486,910 | 0.3% | 1.3% |
| 18 | Mount Rainier | 8,245 | $448,597 | 0.1% | -1.7% |
| 19 | Frostburg | 6,977 | $176,235 | -0.7% | -0.3% |
| 20 | Bladensburg | 9,583 | $317,188 | 0.3% | -2.6% |
| 21 | Mount Airy | 9,805 | $639,007 | 0.6% | 1.3% |
| 22 | La Plata | 10,683 | $481,282 | 2.0% | -0.9% |
| 23 | Bel Air | 10,585 | $461,262 | -0.3% | 1.2% |
| 24 | Cambridge | 13,152 | $266,444 | 0.4% | 0.9% |
| 25 | New Carrollton | 13,564 | $399,605 | 0.1% | -2.4% |
| 26 | Havre de Grace | 14,994 | $404,055 | 0.9% | 1.2% |
| 27 | Elkton | 15,910 | $367,248 | 0.3% | 0.3% |
| 28 | Aberdeen | 17,298 | $343,948 | 2.8% | 2.0% |
| 29 | Easton | 17,308 | $451,055 | 0.6% | 0.9% |
| 30 | Takoma Park | 17,632 | $686,399 | 0.6% | 2.0% |
| 31 | Hyattsville | 20,966 | $403,229 | 0.5% | -1.7% |
| 32 | Westminster | 20,445 | $462,869 | 0.9% | 0.5% |
| 33 | Cumberland | 18,804 | $152,202 | -0.7% | 1.6% |
| 34 | Greenbelt | 24,678 | $285,336 | 0.4% | -1.7% |
| 35 | Laurel | 29,798 | $476,648 | 0.7% | 0.5% |
| 36 | College Park | 34,540 | $437,694 | 0.4% | -0.6% |
| 37 | Salisbury | 33,285 | $264,545 | 0.6% | 0.6% |
| 38 | Annapolis | 40,720 | $618,838 | -0.1% | 1.2% |
| 39 | Hagerstown | 43,665 | $300,051 | 0.4% | -0.1% |
| 40 | Bowie | 57,926 | $524,118 | 0.3% | 0.6% |
| 41 | Gaithersburg | 69,825 | $527,608 | 0.9% | 0.5% |
| 42 | Rockville | 67,671 | $618,892 | 0.7% | 1.8% |
| 43 | Frederick | 83,395 | $466,011 | 3.4% | 0.2% |
| 44 | Baltimore | 573,243 | $188,101 | -0.7% | 1.7% |
Source: U.S. Census ACS 2020-2024 via Saturday Night Science. 44 Maryland cities cleared the filters.
Summary
Summary: The Best Places To Purchase A House In Maryland for 2026
There’s our analysis of the best places to buy a house in Maryland. And, to be clear, we aren’t necessarily saying these places are the best places to live, just that it looks like they might be in a couple of years based on the data.
In fact, every place in the following table meets our criteria, so even though it may not look super long, remember we started off with all 508 places in the state.
The best cities to buy a house in Maryland are Middl, Berlin, Manchester, Cheste, Poolesville, Fruitland, Chesapeake Beach, District Heights, Glenarden, and Walkersville.
So if we could rent or buy in these cities, we’d definitely buy.
