Spring Parade of Homes grows, but Douglas County still drives supply

The Spring Parade of Homes has grown, but it still shows how much of Douglas County’s new-home supply is coming from outside Lawrence. This year’s tour includes 19 homes, up from 13 last year and fewer than 10 in 2024, the biggest Lawrence has had in many years. Even so, nearly half the entries are outside the city, including seven in Baldwin City and two in Eudora.

That matters because the parade is more than a weekend browse for buyers. It is one of the clearest public snapshots of what is actually getting built in the local market, from townhomes in the lower end of the price range to custom houses pushing well above $600,000. The 2026 lineup runs from about $299,950 to $669,900, a spread that shows both the scarcity of entry-level options and the continued appetite for high-end construction.

One of the biggest reasons Lawrence has more homes on the tour is Beth’s Ranch at the southeast corner of Sixth Street and George Williams Way. People are already living there, and the subdivision has more than 100 lots planned. The project first came forward in January 2022 with about 80 all-single-family homes on roughly 20 acres, but city review pushed it toward more density. The approved plan now calls for 106 housing units, including 24 single-family homes and 82 townhomes or duplexes.

The most expensive house on this year’s parade is not in a west Lawrence subdivision. It is in East Lawrence, a reminder that the market can still surprise longtime residents who tend to associate new construction with the city’s west side. That mix of locations, prices and housing types is part of why the Lawrence Home Builders Association says the tour is meant for more than prospective buyers. The group says its goal is to provide safe, decent, affordable housing for Lawrence and surrounding communities.

But the broader housing picture remains tight. Lawrence posted a record-low 57 single-family building permits in 2024, the lowest total in city records that go back to 1956. Douglas County’s population also fell by 19 people in 2025, to 120,920, making it the only urban county in Kansas to lose population that year. Even in the early 1980s, when mortgage rates were above 15%, Lawrence built more single-family homes than it does now. Against that backdrop, the parade looks less like a sign of a broad rebound than a narrow glimpse of a pipeline that is still too small for a county trying to keep pace.