All Forum Posts by: Stella Xu

Hi all - I feel that we're about to see some major migration shifts coming from the expensive urban cities such as NY, Seattle, SF given the new work from home policies that is becoming permanent. It started with the tech sector - twitter, facebook and now other sectors are catching on. I work in the financial services sector in NYC and sense that all the banks/insurance companies etc... are about to do the same because they've seen super high productivity from remote staff over the past few months. they haven't announced it yet but they've implied that they will in a few months. so even after Covid, going into the office will be optional. for most high income earners crowded into the cities - that's a big deal. That means that they no longer have to be tied to a specific city. Some will move to the suburbs but even if 15% of these high income earners were to move elsewhere in the country - that would be a game changer for some of those recipient cities... and it would be good to get ahead of that as investors! I was thinking people will want to move to warm cities in low tax states. the place would also need to have some diversity and fine dining that they're accustomed too. 
->> What cities do you think will benefit from this demographic migration?

@sol bier Good thing you didn't because home prices are dropping in NYC and in 6 months you should in good shape to find a great deal. LA definitely has the best sushi! :)

I live in Manhattan, NYC and grew up here in the city. I'm concerned that we're going to see a reversal of urbanization due to the pandemic. I think what COVID has done is 

1) sped up the migration of millennials to the nearby suburbs - NJ, Westchester, LI 

2) new permanent work from home policy changes lead by the tech industry (Twitter, Facebook) which will echo across industries will make people reconsider where they want to live. That's never been an option until now. A lot of permanent flexible work from home corporate policies (esp in the finance, insurance sectors) are up in the air at the moment and not finalized. As people work from home more they're going to want to have more space and would want to leave densely populated cities. Another issue here is shared washer/dryer space in mega apartment complexes - that alone might be enough to move me!! State income tax would be another consideration. So I think what we're going to see is an exodus from densely populated urban cores to slightly smaller cities - esp to those in warmer climates and tax friendly states. Think Atlanta, Austin, Portland etc...

Going back to your original question - we're also seeing milder winters in NYC as well but it's tough living here. I only realized that when I left NYC to live elsewhere (SF, London, Germany, Shanghai, etc...and those aren't even small). If I were to leave to NYC I'd want to move to the bay area which is even more insanely expensive but I love being on the coast and easy access to gourmet sushi/japanese food is important to me! yes that's actually a consideration :)