In August 2026, the median sale price inside New Albany's city limits was $992,501. That is 18.8% higher than in August 2025, according to Columbus REALTORS. A buyer who looks only at that figure, with Meta, Google, Amazon and Microsoft building a few miles east, would expect a bidding war. The same report shows something else. Average price per square foot fell 5.4%, closed sales were flat, and inventory rose by more than a third.
Two facts explain the gap. The New Albany International Business Park makes the city money much faster than it brings in new households. And a jump in the median in a market this small usually reflects which homes sold that month. It is a weak signal of what any one home is worth. Anyone comparing New Albany with other Columbus suburbs gets a clearer picture by reading those two facts together.
A Higher Median With Slightly Cheaper Square Footage
Here are the August numbers for two geographies that are often mixed up: the City of New Albany itself, and the larger New Albany–Plain Local School District, which spans Franklin and Licking counties.
| August 2026 vs. August 2025 | New Albany city limits | New Albany–Plain Local district |
|---|---|---|
| Closed sales | 22, unchanged | 38, up 18.8% |
| Median sale price | $992,501, up 18.8% | $691,500, down 5.6% |
| Average price per square foot | $306.66, down 5.4% | $278.84, down 7.8% |
| Days on market until sale | 18, down 25% | 18, down 28% |
| Inventory | 30 homes, up 36.4% | 37 homes, down 7.5% |
| Months of supply | 2.2, up 37.5% | 1.6, down 15.8% |
The year-to-date figures show the pattern more clearly. Through August 2026, the city's median sale price was $950,000, up 18.8% from the same period in 2025. Average price per square foot was $306.01, up 0.5%. When the median rises by almost a fifth and price per square foot barely moves, larger homes made up more of the sales. Comparable space did not get much more expensive. The average sale price for August 2026 tells the same story. It was $1,243,182, down 0.3% from a year earlier, even as the median climbed.
The district looks similar on a smaller scale. Its year-to-date median through August 2026 rose 11.1% to $725,000, while price per square foot rose 2.0%. Columbus REALTORS adds its own caution to these reports: percent changes use rounded figures and can look extreme because of small samples. Twenty-two closings in a month is a small sample.
Sellers are not naming their price, either. In August 2026, city sellers received 97.0% of their original list price on average, and the report notes that this figure does not account for concessions. If the business park were driving a wave of new buyers, these numbers would look different.
What the Business Park Actually Builds
New Albany's own data center site counted roughly 15 IT companies in June 2026, with about 40 facilities built and 28 more announced or under construction. The Columbus Dispatch's August 2026 aerial survey put the city at "46 data centers and counting," citing the tracking site DataCenterMap.com.
The amounts of money and land are huge. The Meta complex, under construction since 2022, covers three parcels totaling 591 acres with a combined value of $495,485,675, according to the Licking County Auditor. At the northeast corner of Morse and Beech roads, Meta is putting up tent-style "rapid deployment structures" for Prometheus, its AI-focused expansion. Google's campus behind 1101 Beech Road covers more than 440 acres. That land sold in 2018 for $312,757,515, about $709,200 an acre.
The permanent payroll is small by comparison:
- Amazon Web Services: a $3.5 billion build-out projected 105 full-time jobs and $9 million in annual payroll. That works out to about $33 million of announced investment per promised job.
- Microsoft: a $420 million, 245,000-square-foot data center was estimated to employ at least 30 full-time workers with $1.5 million in annual payroll.
- Meta: the company cites more than $1.5 billion of data center investment in Ohio and more than 300 "operational jobs supported." That is a broader measure than a direct New Albany headcount.
The city states the comparison plainly. Its data center explainer says data centers generally employ fewer people than other commercial uses. It contrasts them with the Personal Care and Beauty Campus, where more than 12 companies employ about 4,000 people. Thousands of permanent jobs bring buyers into local neighborhoods. A data center with a few dozen staff brings very few.
The City Built Its Tax Formula Around the Missing Jobs
New Albany's leaders have planned around this gap. According to the city, its minimum annual service payment formula for data centers exists to offset their relatively low job creation. Those payments can combine municipal income tax, TIF, New Community Authority charges and PILOT cash. The city reports $10 million in community development charge revenue from tax year 2024. It also says a single hyperscaler generated revenue equal to the city income tax on $178 million in payroll. That $178 million is a revenue equivalent. It is not wages paid to people working in New Albany.
The abatements run for decades. The AWS agreement exempts building value from property tax at 100% for 15 years and 75% for the following 15, while the land stays taxable.
In 2026, the city went further. On May 19, council adopted the Clover Valley East rezoning: 106.4 acres near Jug Street and Clover Valley Road, requested by Lincoln Property Company. The zoning text allows manufacturing, warehousing, research, offices and personal services. It prohibits data centers unless they are a secondary use, occupy no more than 20% of building square footage, and get their permits after the primary use does. Aaron Underhill, the applicant's attorney, told council the restriction was a newer element he had seen in a small number of recent approvals, meant to emphasize uses that create jobs. This applies to one tract and is not a citywide ban. It does show which way the city wants its remaining employment land to go.
Intel Is the Employer Still on the Calendar
The project most often expected to bring permanent workers is Intel's $28 billion Ohio One campus. When it was announced in January 2022, it was supposed to open within three years. WOSU reported on August 26, 2026 that Intel still expects to finish the first fab by 2031 but would not say how much construction is complete. In a statement that month, Intel said its deadlines remain flexible based on customer demand. Mayor Sloan Spalding said there had been "some slowdowns" but that "things are picking up."
The delay is visible in the area's infrastructure. In November 2025, AEP Ohio said the Green Chapel substation it had built for Intel was unused under the revised schedule. AEP and a Meta affiliate proposed letting Meta use it temporarily to power a nearby data center. Power built for a chipmaker's workforce has, at least on paper, been offered to a data center.
The people in New Albany's business park every day right now are mostly building it. A trades group and a local official told a Statehouse committee in June 2026 that more than 25,000 construction workers are in New Albany daily because of data center growth. That is a large construction workforce. Each of those jobs ends when its project is finished.
The New Homes in the Pipeline Have Their Own Origins
New residential supply in the city is coming from projects planned years ago. The Hamlet at Sugar Run was rezoned on December 6, 2022, and its final development plan was approved on September 16, 2024. It calls for 40 flats, 128 townhomes and 27 detached homes, plus about 52,000 square feet of commercial space, with a spring 2026 construction start target. Council minutes from May 2026 show the phase three final plat approved, with phase one and phase two plat actions postponed pending engineering review. A separate 39-lot Prairie House Neighborhood was still in rezoning review that month.
None of these project materials describe the homes as housing for tech campus employees. For a buyer, that means the townhomes and flats at the Hamlet will add home types the city's August sales mix largely lacked. Their timing depends on plats and engineering, not on Intel's schedule.
How to Read a New Albany Listing This Fall
The business park pays for a lot of New Albany's civic life, but it does not set the price of a four-bedroom home on a cul-de-sac. These steps will tell you more than the headline median:
- Compare price per square foot first. Through August 2026, the city's year-to-date figure of $306.01 was nearly unchanged from 2025, so a list price far above that level needs a reason specific to the home.
- Confirm the geography. A home in the New Albany–Plain Local district but outside city limits belongs to a market whose August 2026 median was about $300,000 lower.
- Watch inventory inside city limits. Thirty homes and 2.2 months of supply in August 2026 give buyers more room than the 1.6 months a year earlier.
- Treat Intel as a future event. The company's own timeline puts the first fab around 2031, and it calls that timeline flexible.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are data centers pushing New Albany home prices up? The August 2026 figures do not show that. The city's median rose, but price per square foot fell 5.4% and inventory grew, a pattern that fits larger homes selling rather than more buyers competing.
Why does New Albany still approve data centers if they create few jobs? The city says its service payment formula is designed to offset low job creation. It reported $10 million in community development charge revenue for tax year 2024. On at least one new tract, Clover Valley East, it now caps data centers at 20% of building space.
When could Intel affect local demand? Intel told WOSU in August 2026 that it expects to complete its first fab by 2031, with deadlines tied to customer demand.
If you want to know where a specific New Albany home falls against the August 2026 price-per-square-foot figures, and whether it sits inside city limits or only in the district, Luxe Home Team will break it down for you. Request a complimentary market report, and Teresa Powell's team will price the home by its square footage and location, not by the headline median.
