Hurricane Ian and its impact on Flordia's migration

[Steely Dan]

^ but it's all an interconnected local system, per eschaton's astute post.

Now, retirees moving from Chicagoland down to Florida to run out the clock is certainly nowhere close to being the primary reason for Chicago's relative real estate affordability, but it is still a contributing factor for why Chicagoland, as a whole, has more supply and less demand relative to other top tier US cities, and hence why home values here are significantly lower than most others.

[Investing In Chicago]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ but it's all an interconnected local system, per eschaton's astute post.

Now, retirees moving from Chicagoland down to Florida to run out the clock is certainly nowhere close to being the primary reason for Chicago's relative real estate affordability, but it is still a contributing factor for why Chicagoland, as a whole, has more supply and less demand relative to other top tier US cities, and hence why home values here are significantly lower than most others.

I disagree with that premise - I don't believe retirees leaving for Florida impact real estate prices in the city of chicago all that much. Real Estate is hyper local making generalizations across a region of 10M people is hard to do in real estate.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by PhillyRising

I have had friends who moved to Florida who insist that snow storms are worse than Hurricanes.

Seriously.

Living in a city that is susceptible to both... There's simply no comparison between a hurricane and snow storm. It's like comparing a rain shower to a tornado. I've been through probably a dozen blizzards in NYC, but none of them were remotely as catastrophic as "Hurricane" (Superstorm) Sandy.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Investing In Chicago

I disagree with that premise

then we will have to agree to disagree because eschaton's post on the previous page very succinctly describes the interconnectedness of city and suburban real estate markets, IMO.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by Investing In Chicago

I disagree with that premise - I don't believe retirees leaving for Florida impact real estate prices in the city of chicago all that much. Real Estate is hyper local making generalizations across a region of 10M people is hard to do in real estate.

Real estate prices vary within a metro for very localized reasons, but if you look across metros, you will find similar neighborhoods have completely different price points. The nicest neighborhoods in a rust-belt metro might have houses sell in the range of a "bad" neighborhood in the San Francisco bay area. This is clearly due to supply/demand issues.

Of course, people leave San Francisco and retire to Florida as well, however, the Bay Area never really built enough housing to begin with, and never dealt with periods of population stagnation/decline.

[Investing In Chicago]

Originally Posted by eschaton

Real estate prices vary within a metro for very localized reasons, but if you look across metros, you will find similar neighborhoods have completely different price points. The nicest neighborhoods in a rust-belt metro might have houses sell in the range of a "bad" neighborhood in the San Francisco bay area. This is clearly due to supply/demand issues.

Of course, people leave San Francisco and retire to Florida as well, however, the Bay Area never really built enough housing to begin with, and never dealt with periods of population stagnation/decline.

Well yeah, it's clearly due to supply/demand issues, any argument there would be just plain dumb. I don't think Retirees moving to Florida impact housing costs in say, the Austin neighborhood of Chicago. Residents are fleeing Austin, but i'd argue they are fleeing violence and more likely to relocate to other parts of the metro, rather than say Boca.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by eschaton

The metros as a whole? Absolutely. Relatively plentiful supply, relatively low demand.

Inner cities are their own thing, but even they respond to metro-wide housing demand. The worst neighborhoods in Oakland, CA, Boston, MA, or Washington DC are still much, much more expensive than the worst in those cities that you mentioned. Much less likely to have vacant lots too, because land is too valuable even in stone-cold ghetto to abandon entirely.

I don't buy this at all. The Northeast supplies just as many snowbirds to Florida as the industrial Midwest, if not more.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by eschaton

Of course, people leave San Francisco and retire to Florida as well, however, the Bay Area never really built enough housing to begin with, and never dealt with periods of population stagnation/decline.

And the Bay Area gets tons of high(er) income inflow.

I'm pretty sure the Northeast has much higher outmigration than the Midwest to Florida and the Coastal South. But the Northeast gets more upwardly mobile inflow, backfilling the less desirable areas and keeping supply tight.

[galleyfox]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Living in a city that is susceptible to both... There's simply no comparison between a hurricane and snow storm. It's like comparing a rain shower to a tornado. I've been through probably a dozen blizzards in NYC, but none of them were remotely as catastrophic as "Hurricane" (Superstorm) Sandy.

I have had friends who moved to Florida who insist that snow storms are worse than Hurricanes.

Seriously.

Hurricanes are far far far worse than blizzards.

Those friends who say that have never experienced a major hurricane. They’ve probably only seen a few outer bands with typical thunderstorm weather.

I remember Hurricane Wilma was expected to be a Category 5, but downgraded to 3 right before impact. My family had to spend the whole weekend boarding up the windows with plywood by hand so the house had no natural light.

When the eyewall hit, the walls of the house were swaying and the house was creaking in the dark for hours. The 40 ft pine tree collapsed, not hitting the house thank god.

After Wilma was past, we lost power for two weeks in the Florida heat, no air conditioning, no light, no hot water. My stepfather had to put soup on the grill. The shingles were ripped right off the roof, and roofing services had a 5 month backlog.

And that wasn’t even a particular severe impact with storm surge.

My first winter was the Chicago Blizzard of 2011.

I was not stupid enough to drive in it, just as I’m not stupid enough to drive in a hurricane. So I just looked at the window with hot chocolate watching the snow piles increase.

Which one sounded more enjoyable?

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Investing In Chicago

Well yeah, it's clearly due to supply/demand issues, any argument there would be just plain dumb. I don't think Retirees moving to Florida impact housing costs in say, the Austin neighborhood of Chicago.

no, not so much directly, but because chicagoland does send legions of retirees to the sunbelt every year, that does open up more housing in the burbs for austin residents looking to to get out to "escape" to.

now of course, as crawford pointed out, the real reason for this is that chicagoland gets nowhere near the same influx of newcomers to back-fill those suburban homes vacated by retirees as cities in the northeast get, so there's even less demand for those homes, making them even more affordable to those looking to get out of the city.

it's all inter-related, and while old people leaving town to chase sunshine is a part of the equation, the real driver is just lower overall demand across the board when comparing a metro like chicagoland to say NYC or boston.

and on the supply side of the equation, the fact that chicagoland (like most other midwest metros) has virtually unlimited flat, empty, and oh so easily developable land surrounding it with almost zero controls on outward growth is also a significant differentiator.

[eschaton]

IIRC from Census data, almost every state in the Northeast/Midwest has significant outflow due to domestic migration. The only exceptions were Delaware, DC, and South Dakota (of all places - probably due to the Black Hills).

If an area is losing people due to domestic migration, it pretty much has to make up the difference through either natural population growth or immigration. And with birth rates falling virtually everywhere, most of the difference is going to be from immigration.

Translate this to housing, and out-migration to the South/West is going to be a significant drag on property prices everywhere that doesn't attract enough new immigrants to make up the difference.

[Investing In Chicago]

Originally Posted by eschaton

IIRC from Census data, almost every state in the Northeast/Midwest has significant outflow due to domestic migration. The only exceptions were Delaware, DC, and South Dakota (of all places - probably due to the Black Hills).

If an area is losing people due to domestic migration, it pretty much has to make up the difference through either natural population growth or immigration. And with birth rates falling virtually everywhere, most of the difference is going to be from immigration.

Translate this to housing, and out-migration to the South/West is going to be a significant drag on property prices everywhere that doesn't attract enough new immigrants to make up the difference.

I agree, but i'm not sure what point you are making.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by Investing In Chicago

I agree, but i'm not sure what point you are making.

1. Domestic migration is the main factor which causes population stagnation/decline across a metropolitan area.

2. Population stagnation/decline is generally associated with a weaker real estate market.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by galleyfox

After Wilma was past, we lost power for two weeks in the Florida heat, no air conditioning, no light, no hot water.

...and pets die in large numbers because of these storms. Saltwater fish tanks are done if their power is cut for an hour. Freshwater can last a bit longer, but certainly not for days. Lizards that need heat and specific food die. Snakes get out. Birds fly away.

Many people don't leave because of their wide array of pets. It's bad for all involved.

This photo gallery includes a video of the Coast Guard rescuing a 75~ year-old woman with a helicopter, along with three cats presumably jammed into a single pet carrier. Those cats might be traumatized for the rest of their lives more because of the loud helicopter than the storm.
https://www.wsj.com/story/photos-the...d=hp_lead_pos8

[Investing In Chicago]

Originally Posted by eschaton

1. Domestic migration is the main factor which causes population stagnation/decline across a metropolitan area.

2. Population stagnation/decline is generally associated with a weaker real estate market.

Ok, well I agree with this, but this seems obvious

[galleyfox]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

...and pets die in large numbers because of these storms. Saltwater fish tanks are done if their power is cut for an hour. Freshwater can last a bit longer, but certainly not for days. Lizards that need heat and specific food die. Snakes get out. Birds fly away.

Many people don't leave because of their wide array of pets. It's bad for all involved.

The crux of the problem is that until Ian, Florida hasn’t had a direct hit from hurricanes in about 16 years, with the exception of Irma. Yeah, no wonder Floridians suddenly think major hurricanes are no big deal.

Even without a direct hit, a normal or a busy hurricane year is weeks of emergency stockpiling, gas shortages, evacuations, unpaid work days, school closures, power outages, property damage, and general stress.






https://fcit.usf.edu/florida/maps/ga..._Recordset1=96

A hurricane hasn’t made Florida landfall in over 10 years. Hermine is set to end that streak.

Florida has not experienced hurricane conditions since 2005 during Hurricane Wilma. In fact, the entire Gulf of Mexico hadn’t had a hurricane since Ingrid in 2013 – a period of almost three years – the longest on record.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...d-that-streak/

Since Irma tracked northward through Florida in September 2017, no hurricane has made landfall in the state's peninsula in the last five years.

Looking at the map of hurricane tracks over the past four seasons, it almost appears as if there has been a shield over the peninsula, deflecting hurricanes away.

https://www.wunderground.com/article...uck-since-irma

[hughfb3]

Originally Posted by galleyfox

The crux of the problem is that until Ian, Florida hasn’t had a direct hit from hurricanes in about 16 years, with the exception of Irma. Yeah, no wonder Floridians suddenly think major hurricanes are no big deal.

Even without a direct hit, a normal or a busy hurricane year is weeks of emergency stockpiling, gas shortages, evacuations, unpaid work days, school closures, power outages, property damage, and general stress.

I remember that 2004 season. It was crazy to get hit in Orlando with 4 hurricanes in 6 weeks... we were out of school for almost 2 months. And Ivan did a whole loop-dee-loop to come back around as if experiencing his outer bands wasn’t enough the first time. He wanted to make sure he hit the entire panhandle, peninsula… all the gulf states and the southern states on the Atlantic. He came for it all

[hughfb3]

Originally Posted by AviationGuy

To me, the issue isn't the "death" of these areas. The issue is the way people continue to build in areas that are destined for exactly what has happened repeatedly, and will continue to happen.

This is the same conversation that parts of California are in with regards to wildfires. We know certain areas are prone to wildfires… and in many areas, it is a vital part of the ecosystem. For instance; the natural ecosystem of Malibu, CA in Los Angeles County says it’s “supposed to” have a fire that sweeps the area every 20 years or so to keep the natural life refreshed and alive… yet we want to keep building multi million dollar homes in this area… then tax payer dollars are spent on fire/rescue/rebuilding for it to happen every 20 years on repeats… all the while, there is plenty of land in Los Angeles County that is not prone to fire.

Link to article written after the devastating 2018 Malibu Fires if you’re interested… https://longreads.com/2018/12/04/the...g-malibu-burn/

The Case for Letting Malibu Burn: Many of California’s native ecosystems evolved to burn. Modern fire suppression creates fuels that lead to catastrophic fires. So why do people insist on rebuilding in the firebelt?

Lee County, FL may be one of those areas. Let’s not forget Cape Coral and Punta Gorda had the same devastating images coming out after the 2004 Charlie hurricane hit them in almost the same path as Ian just 18 years ago. As someone who grew up a 4th generation Floridian, I’ve seen the utter devastation the human built environment has on certain areas that are historically low lying flood prone swamp. They demolish whole swamps and have to completely take down every tree to then bring in tons of dirt to raise the land because most of it is at swamp level where the land has evolved to accumulate water. It’s these areas, I question…

Should we let (parts of) Florida flood???

[galleyfox]

Originally Posted by hughfb3

I remember that 2004 season. It was crazy to get hit in Orlando with 4 hurricanes in 6 weeks... we were out of school for almost 2 months. And Ivan did a whole loop-dee-loop to come back around as if experiencing his outer bands wasn’t enough the first time. He wanted to make sure he hit the entire panhandle, peninsula… all the gulf states and the southern states on the Atlantic. He came for it all

What’s worrying me right now is the emergency response. I’ve had a bad feeling about this storm since the reports of surge in the Keys before the Ft. Myers-Cape Coral landfall. That was not that common in the Keys even when they had a direct strike.

My great-grandfather was in South Florida during the Labor Day Hurricane.

My step-grandmother was in Lely during Hurricane Donna.

My family members have lived through Andrew, Charley, Wilma, Irma, ect.


Ambulance convoys and talk of “Grim discoveries” in Cape Coral make me very uneasy about the situation.

https://twitter.com/singhpuru2202/st...3EUhL9cZoiWxug

https://twitter.com/willnunley/statu...3EUhL9cZoiWxug

Though what a survival story here. The family was still in the home during the video of the structure floating away, and managed to survive swimming through the storm surge.


https://twitter.com/mesomax919/statu...3EUhL9cZoiWxug

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by hughfb3

This is the same conversation that parts of California are in with regards to wildfires. We know certain areas are prone to wildfires… and in many areas, it is a vital part of the ecosystem. For instance; the natural ecosystem of Malibu, CA in Los Angeles County says it’s “supposed to” have a fire that sweeps the area every 20 years or so to keep the natural life refreshed and alive… yet we want to keep building multi million dollar homes in this area… then tax payer dollars are spent on fire/rescue/rebuilding for it to happen every 20 years on repeats… all the while, there is plenty of land in Los Angeles County that is not prone to fire.

Link to article written after the devastating 2018 Malibu Fires if you’re interested… https://longreads.com/2018/12/04/the...g-malibu-burn/



Lee County, FL may be one of those areas. Let’s not forget Cape Coral and Punta Gorda had the same devastating images coming out after the 2004 Charlie hurricane hit them in almost the same path as Ian just 18 years ago. As someone who grew up a 4th generation Floridian, I’ve seen the utter devastation the human built environment has on certain areas that are historically low lying flood prone swamp. They demolish whole swamps and have to completely take down every tree to then bring in tons of dirt to raise the land because most of it is at swamp level where the land has evolved to accumulate water. It’s these areas, I question…

Should we let (parts of) Florida flood???

All true…but does California get a special deal like Florida vis-à-vis the NFIP or the Florida equivalent?