Trends evident in The Warren Group’s 2018 home sale data and a new report saying Boston has the worst rush hour traffic in the country are more closely tied than they may seem.

The home sale data collected by Banker & Tradesman’s publisher reveals that some buyers are now looking to Worcester County for affordable homes. As Jay Fitzgerald writes in this week’s cover story, Worcester County saw single-family home sales slide down last year to 8,680, from 8,883 in 2017. At the same time, the median price for single-family homes rose to $275,000 last year, from $259,900 in 2017.

Area real estate agents see a trend, too. Buyers are not collectively making a mad dash for the hills beyond Interstate 495, but agents told Fitzgerald they are seeing an uptick in interest. Some homes are selling for notably more money than they would have in years past, and more properties are attracting multiple bids in areas where such behavior is rare.

Putting Worcester County’s prices in context with the larger Massachusetts market offers a hint at what might be going on.

The year saw the median single-family home sale price surge to a record high $385,000 in 2018, up from $365,000 in 2017. Condominium prices also grew to $365,000 last year, up from $341,000 in 2017.

At the same time, the number of sales continued to decline, from 61,195 in 2017 to 59,837 in 2018. Statewide condo sales also fell last year to 24,515 units, down from 24,848 in 2017.

The contrast is even more stark in the core of Greater Boston. There, the 2018 median single-family home prices ranged from a low of $440,000 in Essex County to a high of $549,000 in Suffolk. Suffolk’s median condo price even outstripped its median single-family price at $615,000.

Faced with a choice like this, it’s little wonder metro Boston buyers who are willing to tough out a long commute, or who are simple priced out of closer-in communities, would cast a curious eye towards Worcester County.

The forces that enabled Boston to claim its most recent and most dubious championship crown are clear in this light.

The rise of Uber and Lyft, and Beacon Hill’s unconscionable decades-long neglect of our local and regional mass transit, certainly helped push the region to the top of traffic analytics firm INRIX’s annual ranking of bad commutes, but rising housing costs driven by a lack of suburban production are a significant factor. Indeed, over 85,000 area commuters spent more than 90 minutes on one-way trips to or from work in 2016, according to the most recent research by Apartment List.

As the saying goes, “drive until you qualify.”