Will people leave cities post COVID 19?

Real Estate Agent · Spokane, WA & North Idaho · Member since 2017 · 135 posts · 170 votes

An article recently published by Redfin highlights the current working from home trend. In a survey it's revealed that up to 1 in 4 newly remote workers expect to continue working from home after COVID 19 passes.

Imagine if you were paying $4000 a month in rent for an apartment in a major city with a strict pet policy and nowhere to park. Suddenly COVID 19 hits and you realize that all you need to earn money is an internet connection.

Almost overnight you begin to think it might be nice to have a house with a garage, some land, somewhere for a couple of dogs to run around and maybe even somewhere to start a family ... and also it might be nice to do all this for half the price of your current rent.

I think this is a real possibility but what impact will it have on the nations major cities? I'd love to hear peoples arguments for cities because I haven't seen much in the press of late.

Original article - https://www.redfin.com/blog/wf...

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Russell BrazilBusiness Member

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Real Estate Agent · Washington, D.C. · Member since 2012 · 17k+ posts · 30k+ votes

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Russell BrazilBusiness Member
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Real Estate Agent · Washington, D.C. · Member since 2012 · 17k+ posts · 30k+ votes
6y
No.
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Joseph CacciapagliaBusiness Member
Lender · San Antonio, TX · Member since 2020 · 1k+ posts · 1k+ votes
6y
I believe a lot of people will leave the highest cost and most dense cities. Some will move to the suburbs, and others will move to more affordable cities. I've already had a number of tech workers, who are suddenly allowed to work remotely, contact me about moving to San Antonio, because it's much more affordable, but still has a decent city lifestyle. So far I've heard from people planning to move from the Bay Area, Denver, Austin, DC, Philadelphia, and NYC. I think there are a lot of people that will still want to live in cities, but may start to opt for lower cost and slightly less dense ones.
I'm not sure it will be a high enough percent to really harm the larger cities, but it should be enough to actually help out some of the lower cost cities and suburbs. People have been drawn to cities for thousands of years, so I don't think they're going to just implode. They may just lose a bit of their edge.
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Ujwal Velagapudi
Investor/Agent/Entrepreneur · Dallas, TX · Member since 2016 · 464 posts · 564 votes
6y
I've been thinking this will definitely happen to some extent. I don't think it will be a mass exodus, but something that the minority of people working fully remote jobs, who also don't care much for the city they're in, are willing to move. This has already been happening as Texas has been getting a lot of CA and NY folks departing the major cities for a better cost of living while still working their tech jobs.
I think Facebook did mention they will look to re-adjust the salaries accordingly based on your new "home" base, and I think most other companies will follow. I don't see anybody getting SF engineer money for living in a small town in the middle of nowhere. Depending on how much their salaries actually are re-adjusted will also factor into their decision to move.
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Jordan MoorheadBusiness Member
Real Estate Agent · Austin, TX · Member since 2015 · 5k+ posts · 3k+ votes
6y
I don't think so. I think in 6-12 months people will have mostly forgotten about it. It wasn't even that serious?? People don't leave cities because you're more likely to get the flu on a subway than in a field?
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Aaron Gordy
Real Estate Broker · Austin, TX · Member since 2012 · 1k+ posts · 1k+ votes
6y
No. People will still live in cities because of all the attractions of the city. In Austin during sxsw one can see some of the biggest acts and sometimes for free on Auditorium Shores. In other times of the year, one can see big acts in small places at times. I saw wu tang at a house party once... In NYC one can see a Yankees baseball game on a Saturday during the day and a broadway play at night. Good fun! One can't do that in the countryside.
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David MartinPro Member
Cypress, TX · Member since 2016 · 137 posts · 119 votes
6y
@Phil Wells Sure, there's the potential that some fractional percentage of people may want to leave major cities to telecommute, but honestly, broadband outside of most major city areas is abysmal. For anyone seriously looking to move and telecommute full time, that's going to be a must, so yeah, maybe the really dense and pricey areas take a small drop for a short time, but that likely will get filled in by the outer ring of suburbia around them that's been waiting for years to move in closer to the city when the price was right.
From there you have to think... where would they go if they were both trying to get away from dense populations but still have options?... Some ideas could be the triangle of Des Moines, Kansas City and Omaha. Middle America house pricing, but hey, you're within an hour drive of a major data center for every serious cloud services company. Probably Iowa area as a preference, as they don't block muni networks, so really small cities there can build out fat pipes to the internet to attract telecommuters that need lots of bandwidth, but want small town population density, and short drive to 3 larger cities if you want to still have the occasional city experiences.
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Joe P.
Philadelphia, PA · Member since 2017 · 824 posts · 1k+ votes
6y
Originally posted by @Jordan Moorhead:
I don't think so. I think in 6-12 months people will have mostly forgotten about it. It wasn't even that serious?? People don't leave cities because you're more likely to get the flu on a subway than in a field?

I think you missed the point of the article (by miles) and the severity of covid (by a few yard lengths). So, lets try again.
The prevailing thought is that folks will leave their current location spurned on by the ability to work anywhere - proximity to job is no longer important or vital. That may be the case, especially for some tech workers, but I don't see that becoming a major trend. I think people will work remotely but there is always the need for office time, perhaps even 1-2 days every 3 months, for example, which become impossible/expensive when you move away from your job completely. Some folks can work like that and some companies may allow it -- I work from home and have been working from home since 2014, but still I have to head into the office about 6-10 times a year and visit clients about 10 times per year...so I could see that being a barrier for companies. The transition into WFH right now is out of necessity; when necessity passes it becomes leisure, and at the discretion of the companies. It may transition to partial WFH, but proximity is still important -- in other words, I don't see a mass exodus on the horizon, losses will be gradual over time and most likely beset by or eclipsed by the young folk who enjoy city life and want to live the city life.
Regarding severity of covid, well, this isn't the place for a discussion on it. My wife always says -- such a smart lady -- there is my version, there is your version, and there is the truth. The truth of covid is still evolving, both scientifically and socially. 112,000 are dead. That's a lot of bodies. And that's with everyone supposedly avoiding each other for over 2 months. This could potentially get a lot worse -- but I hope I'm wrong.
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Phil Wells
OP
Real Estate Agent · Spokane, WA & North Idaho · Member since 2017 · 135 posts · 170 votes
6y
Originally posted by @Joseph Cacciapaglia:
I believe a lot of people will leave the highest cost and most dense cities. Some will move to the suburbs, and others will move to more affordable cities. I've already had a number of tech workers, who are suddenly allowed to work remotely, contact me about moving to San Antonio, because it's much more affordable, but still has a decent city lifestyle. So far I've heard from people planning to move from the Bay Area, Denver, Austin, DC, Philadelphia, and NYC. I think there are a lot of people that will still want to live in cities, but may start to opt for lower cost and slightly less dense ones.
I'm not sure it will be a high enough percent to really harm the larger cities, but it should be enough to actually help out some of the lower cost cities and suburbs. People have been drawn to cities for thousands of years, so I don't think they're going to just implode. They may just lose a bit of their edge.

I think you hit the nail on the head with this comment. The highest priced, most densely populated cities are the most likely victims of this trend. I don't think for a minute people are going to go live in a cabin in the woods, but are people going to trade NYC for a place that's half the price but an hour outside the city, I think so.

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Phil Wells
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Real Estate Agent · Spokane, WA & North Idaho · Member since 2017 · 135 posts · 170 votes
6y
Originally posted by @Ujwal Velagapudi:
I've been thinking this will definitely happen to some extent. I don't think it will be a mass exodus, but something that the minority of people working fully remote jobs, who also don't care much for the city they're in, are willing to move. This has already been happening as Texas has been getting a lot of CA and NY folks departing the major cities for a better cost of living while still working their tech jobs.
I think Facebook did mention they will look to re-adjust the salaries accordingly based on your new "home" base, and I think most other companies will follow. I don't see anybody getting SF engineer money for living in a small town in the middle of nowhere. Depending on how much their salaries actually are re-adjusted will also factor into their decision to move.

This is very true - there are still a large percentage of jobs like retail, hospitality, manufacturing, etc that can't be done remotely.
That's a very interesting point regarding adjusted pay. People will have to weigh quality of life and see whether it makes sense to leave the cities.

1 Reply
Phil Wells
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Real Estate Agent · Spokane, WA & North Idaho · Member since 2017 · 135 posts · 170 votes
6y
Originally posted by @Jordan Moorhead:
I don't think so. I think in 6-12 months people will have mostly forgotten about it. It wasn't even that serious?? People don't leave cities because you're more likely to get the flu on a subway than in a field?

The article isn't about COVID 19 - it's about the WFH trend. I'm not suggesting people go live in a field but that maybe people might leave high population density areas in favor of a city suburb, a nearby small town, the beach, etc.

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Phil Wells
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Real Estate Agent · Spokane, WA & North Idaho · Member since 2017 · 135 posts · 170 votes
6y
Originally posted by @Aaron Gordy:
No. People will still live in cities because of all the attractions of the city. In Austin during sxsw one can see some of the biggest acts and sometimes for free on Auditorium Shores. In other times of the year, one can see big acts in small places at times. I saw wu tang at a house party once... In NYC one can see a Yankees baseball game on a Saturday during the day and a broadway play at night. Good fun! One can't do that in the countryside.

I like this comment and it's a very good point well made. Side note SXSW is on my bucket list still.

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David MartinPro Member
Cypress, TX · Member since 2016 · 137 posts · 119 votes
6y
@Phil Wells so... "but are people going to trade NYC for a place that's half the price but an hour outside the city, I think so"

yeah, but that's the deal, people already do that, so what's the difference here? I mean, my fried in Mahopac, NY doesn't live there because he loves the commute to Stamford, he lives there because Stamford and NYC are super pricey, and he gets better value for what he wants. The deal is, I don't think in these examples that the 'people leaving' part is the focus... it's where are they going?... having 0.15% of NYC workforce decide to work somewhere else doesn't move the needle much. Now, if you told me they all decided to move to Scranton, PA... well that's suddenly a like 1.6% boost in the population for that town... which is a much bigger deal... so I guess to answer your OP question... I don't really think it's going to affect major cities that much, but, for mid-sized cities that are big enough to have decent broadband footprints, this could be boom times for them. So I prefer, in this situation, to focus on which smaller places are winning bigger in this case than the larger cities are losing.
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Phil Wells
OP
Real Estate Agent · Spokane, WA & North Idaho · Member since 2017 · 135 posts · 170 votes
6y
Originally posted by @David Martin:
@Phil Wells so... "but are people going to trade NYC for a place that's half the price but an hour outside the city, I think so"

yeah, but that's the deal, people already do that, so what's the difference here? I mean, my fried in Mahopac, NY doesn't live there because he loves the commute to Stamford, he lives there because Stamford and NYC are super pricey, and he gets better value for what he wants. The deal is, I don't think in these examples that the 'people leaving' part is the focus... it's where are they going?... having 0.15% of NYC workforce decide to work somewhere else doesn't move the needle much. Now, if you told me they all decided to move to Scranton, PA... well that's suddenly a like 1.6% boost in the population for that town... which is a much bigger deal... so I guess to answer your OP question... I don't really think it's going to affect major cities that much, but, for mid-sized cities that are big enough to have decent broadband footprints, this could be boom times for them. So I prefer, in this situation, to focus on which smaller places are winning bigger in this case than the larger cities are losing.

Your last sentence - 100% accurate.

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Daniel Boruch
Rental Property Investor · Toronto, ON · Member since 2020 · 8 posts · 6 votes
6y
Seems that joe Rogan, was house shopping in Texas.
Twitter said that employees don’t need to be from SAN Fran now, this is huge. Covid sped up trends by 10 years in my
Opinion.
5 Reply
Jordan MoorheadBusiness Member
Real Estate Agent · Austin, TX · Member since 2015 · 5k+ posts · 3k+ votes
6y
I understand that lots of people are forced to work from home right now and are able to do that. I don't know any employers that will continue to allow 100% work from home. Maybe a day or two a week but people generally are going to want their employees in the office and close enough to come to the office if they need to. I do believe that at some point in time 100% WFH will be more widespread, I just don't think we're there yet.
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Syed H.
Developer · NY/NJ/PA · Member since 2018 · 758 posts · 935 votes
6y
No. No one wants to live in the boonies.
People also forget half the country has horrendous technological infrastructure. It’s not as easy to WFH in the random small towns of America as most urban cities when your best available internet speed is 10% as fast as the “norm”
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Joe SplitrockPro Member
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Rental Property Investor · Sioux Falls, SD · Member since 2015 · 9k+ posts · 18k+ votes
6y
@David Martin I wouldn't assume broadband in the city is better than outside major cities. I am sure it depends on the part of the country, but I have many coworkers in big cities that have horrible internet. I live in a relatively small city and we have gigabit wired options. We have three wired broadband service providers and one wireless provider operating in the city. Even in rural areas in my state they have fiber internet. The rural telecommunications act subsides it, so the coops pay almost nothing for it. We also have the advantage of less users connecting directly to the internet back bone. Add to that SpaceX has been putting Starlink broadband satellites into orbit, which will wire the entire world to fast internet with service starting later this year. Other companies like Amazon are planning to launch competitive services.

@Phil Wells the changing attitude of "work from home" flexibility is going to force changes. People have been geographically tied to their employer and stuck with horrible soul sucking commutes. Many people don't want to go back to that. The other reality is big cities are struggling to maintain control. Vandalism and looting are destroying beautiful cities. Some cities are responding with anti-police legislation or even proposing to defund the police. People want to live in a safe and clean city.
Who knows, it may not be a statistically significant number of people when all is said and done. It is a trend worth watching.

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Phil Wells
OP
Real Estate Agent · Spokane, WA & North Idaho · Member since 2017 · 135 posts · 170 votes
6y
@Joe Splitrock I think you said what I've being trying to said perfectly. Now that the 'geographical tie" to cities is eroding the trend is definitely worth paying attention to. Not to mention the fact that pre-covid we were already seeing migration patterns from California to Texas and New York to Florida, for example. I think there's opportunity for investors in this migration pattern.
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David MartinPro Member
Cypress, TX · Member since 2016 · 137 posts · 119 votes
6y
@Joe Splitrock yep... South Dakota has no blocks on municipal broadband development, so you have that advantage there. Not all the states are as lucky. Starlink will be interesting. I think through end of this year limits are Canada and Northern US, but will be interesting to see how that one pans out globally.
1 Reply
Hai Loc
Specialist · Toronto, Ontario · Member since 2012 · 2k+ posts · 891 votes
6y
The cost to renounce your US Citizen ships has increased from $350 to $2500 I believe. Don’t quote me exact figures.. US is ready for this..
1 Reply
Mark Cruse
Investor · Fort Washington, MD · Member since 2014 · 1k+ posts · 1k+ votes
6y
I doubt if there will be any significant shift. The cities have so much to offer and it has and most likely will always be the cool place people want to be. In terms of the working from home stuff; I have been doing that for a decade. It baffles me that people are just discovering this through COVID.
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Ben StoodleyBusiness Member
Lender · San Diego, CA · Member since 2014 · 264 posts · 161 votes
6y
Hey @Phil Wells this has been a fun topic to discuss for sure. The replies already posted have covered the far ends of each side of the debate. In short, my opinion is people move to other locations for various reasons, all these variables are still in play post covid/quarantine changes. Companies will allow portions of their workforce to work remotely for sure, but this trend was already happening. Like @Daniel Boruch mentioned, the Covid crisis sped up the inevitable. These changes are still going to take years to notice a large enough change in cities/towns, company structures, etc.
Generational preferences are a larger contributor in my opinion. As the baby boomer generations continue to move out of the work force, technology may continue to evolve to allow the younger generations the ability to work differently. The choice of city or small town will depend more and more on lifestyle.
1 Reply
Bennie Leija
Developer · Houston area · Member since 2020 · 56 posts · 26 votes
6y
I moved out to the “boonies” and we used to live in Houston, 2 yrs ago. I like working from home. I’m now in my mid-50’s and I guess the city and commute just takes years out of you.
Our current life is in a small town with only 5000 residents. I actually love the country life. I own 10 acres and built me a real nice pool and 4000 sq ft home.
My boss and company are all about safety. With them fostering safety it makes me work more hours but it ‘ok’ with me.
Htown traffic is terrible I couldn’t imagine how NY, LA, or Chicago’s is.
Good talk
Bennie
6 Reply
Aaron Taylor
Olathe, KS · Member since 2018 · 148 posts · 207 votes
6y
Working from home does not take great internet. If you're doing remote desktop, even like 1.5 meg connection will work, which beyond bad (I know because I used to use that at one point for a little bit). The only thing that would take more is if you're doing huge file transfers or zoom calls, but even then 10 meg should work fine.
I don't even know if the question is will people leave cities, but more "Will people still move to cities from their college towns?". So now you have a company like Facebook who wants to move 50% of the their workforce remote eventually. Previously, college grads had to pick from San Fran, New York, or Seattle, increasing the population and inflation in those cities. Now, those people may not even come because it will save Facebook a ton of money to have them just stay where they're at. No office to maintain, way smaller salary, etc. So that alone will make a big difference over time. If I would have been offered the chance to work remotely while still living in my college town I would have taken that option in a heartbeat.
As far as the cities themselves, I'm guessing that the major difference is that places that were previously "too far to commute from" are now possibilities. So the suburbs may see price appreciation whereas the the more condensed locations may not.
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Alex West
New to Real Estate · MA · Member since 2020 · 1 post · 0 votes
6y
@Joe P.
So I was thinking of house hacking in Philadelphia, I've been keeping a close eye on the market and there are over 30 new listings a day on MLS sites this month (a slight exaggeration with every day).
What would be your analysis on this movement? Are people just reacting to unemployment & renting //or work from home away from the city?
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