Downtown Covington Has Everything You Love About New Orleans

By Gregg Tepper

I have been married to my wonderful wife Letha for 29 years. We have 3 children: Max, Alexander and Charlotte. I have been a licensed Realtor in the New Orleans area for 20 years and am the Operator of The Tepper Group with Keller Williams Realty in Mandeville. Our team services the entire New Orleans and Baton Rouge metro areas. Our team of partners has well over 40 years of experience. In 2024 we helped 132 families buy, sell and lease homes, land and commercial investments.

Take the best parts of New Orleans, the food, the architecture, the hospitality, the oak trees draped in Spanish moss, and condense it all into a walkable downtown. Add some parks, festivals, and a river running through it. That’s Downtown Covington.

It offers all of those things in a setting that feels more intimate and more livable than the city across the lake, and most people don’t realize just how much is here until they experience it for themselves. Covington was recently featured in Southern Living magazine as a great place to visit, and once you spend some time in the downtown area, it’s easy to see why.

The food scene rivals New Orleans. This is a big one for us. Downtown Covington has an incredible range of dining, from fine restaurants to casual spots that punch way above their weight. Del Porto Ristorante has been a downtown favorite for years. Feliciana is John Besh’s brand-new French bistro, and Tavi is another standout. Aki is a ten-seat-plus-sushi-bar restaurant tucked right into downtown, the kind of place you’d expect to find in a much bigger city.

There’s the Covington Beer Garden, Meribo with their hot chicken sandwich, and plenty more. You genuinely don’t have to cross the lake to experience world-class food. It’s all right here.

Festivals bring downtown to life year-round. The Three Rivers Art Festival in November is huge and keeps growing every year. They close down several blocks, and local artists from the galleries around downtown to showcase their work across every medium.

The Columbia Street Block Party happens six times a year, in the spring and fall, every Friday, with car shows, live music, and people walking up and down the streets. White Linen Night is another highlight, when everyone dresses up, restaurants open their doors, shops put their wares out, and the whole downtown becomes one big celebration. One year, Gregg’s daughter Charlotte’s ballet school performed right in the street during White Linen Night. That’s what Covington is about.

Downtown is a real, working city center. This isn’t just a cute strip of restaurants. Covington is home to the parish courthouse, so you have attorneys, medical offices, St. Tammany Health System, banks, private businesses, boutiques, and shops all within walking distance. There’s a great library, one of the largest branches in the system.

Acquistapace’s has a fine wine selection and the kind of inventory where you can find duck legs without a special order. There’s diverse business here, from Neatly Printing to small carpentry shops, and it all contributes to a downtown that feels alive and functioning, not just a tourist destination.

Homes range from $250,000 to well over a million. Downtown Covington has beautiful architecture and classic New Orleans-style homes with oak trees and Spanish moss lining the streets. There are homes well over a million dollars for buyers looking for something premium, plenty in the $500,000 to $1 million range, and if you look carefully, properties as low as $250,000 to $300,000.

It offers a wide range of pricing in a walkable, established neighborhood, which is rare. There are also three great private schools in Downtown Covington, making it a strong fit for families.

Parks and trails add another layer. Bogue Falaya Park sits on the edge of downtown along the Bogue Falaya River. There’s a playground, frisbee golf, and a paddler’s boat launch for kayaks and canoes.

The Tammany Trace also runs through downtown, connecting Covington to Slidell. Right along the trace near the Covington Beer Garden, there’s a stage and festival area similar to the one in Old Mandeville. It’s a great spot to sit, hang out, and enjoy the outdoors without leaving the city limits.

Elevation is another advantage. Downtown Covington tends to sit at a higher elevation than the surrounding areas, so flood insurance is often not necessary, though we always recommend it. Flooding incidents are less common here than in areas like Old Mandeville, which is one more practical reason the location works well for homeowners.

Old Covington is one of those places that fits just about any stage of life, whether you’re a younger family, somewhere in the middle, or a retiree who wants walkability and culture without the subdivision feel.

There’s a price point for just about everybody, and the lifestyle is hard to match anywhere else in Southeast Louisiana. If you’d like to come visit or want to explore what’s available in Downtown Covington, reach out at (985) 218-5445 or TGroup@kw.com, or visit findnolahomes.com. We’d love to help you find your spot.