Where Will You Live in 5 Years? Who’s Moving Where? City, Suburbs, Boonies?

 

There is no doubt that Dallas is becoming more urban, and it’s about time it did. Yesterday I met with a spectacular young man who lives downtown with his family, owns one car, and asked me to imagine a Dallas with no parking places. Hard to do, but I am trying. There is always something so liberating about getting around in NYC without a car. But Dallas? This is a car town, right?

Yesterday, I picked up a friend at her Dallas hotel to learn she had not rented a car in Dallas. What, I asked, flabberghasted?  How would she get around? She took a cab from Love Field, which is way closer in than DFW for God sakes, and planned to use Yellow cab and Uber to get around — it would be cheaper. With the Wright Amendment lifted, you can now get from the airport and around in Dallas with taxis for less than the cost of renting a car. Change MY frame of mind!

We are told that across the country, more people want to live in urban areas than the boonies — ditch cars, walk more, live-work-play and lock and leave for vacation.

Then we read about the Linked-In employee who rode BART in San Francisco with measles for two weeks. Jesus. Or the precious young woman, acquaintance of my children, who was tragically killed this week by a drunk driver in Uptown while she was leaning into a car. I know these are isolated cases brought on by unbalanced people, but still, it makes you wonder: does living in the boonies keep you safer?

According to a poll by Trulia, people who currently live in suburban and rural areas are satisfied with their locale — so much that they want to remain in the same area in five years. In other words, they don’t want to move.

On the flipside, more city dwellers want to move away from the city to the suburbs than the other way around. That includes young adults ages 18 to 34, who are normally seen as magnets for urban areas.

So why are city dwellers considering the great suburban migration? And why are so many people considering moving to rural areas in the next five years?

I have heard so much about this: suburbanites are all moving to the city, Park Cities residents are moving to the suburbs. Everyone wants a ranch. People are shedding ranches. Sheesh. Trulia did some work for me here by asking people who are currently living in the city and looking to move what’s so great about the suburbs. I’ll give you a hint: better schools, more space, less crime, and the same amenities as in the city.

1. Millennials are settling down and having bambinos

It costs a lot to live in the city, the schools tend to be iffy (hello, DISD drama) and many millennials grew up in the suburbs. So it cannot be that bad…

Many 20-somethings who live in urban areas and are considering starting a family might move to the suburbs where they can enjoy a bigger living space.

Although times have changed and the ‘burbs are no longer synonymous with Leave It To Beaver-style idealism, many families continue to embrace the suburban life — and that’s because it makes sense for many. Housing prices, public school ratings, and the cost of private schools and daycare are frequently more favorable in the suburbs.

In fact, a whopping 93% of young renters say they believe in the American Dream and “plan to buy a home someday,” according to findings from another Trulia survey. Add in increasingly expensive real estate in urban areas, and you have yet another reason for the migration to the ‘burbs.

Aalap Shah is a classic case of “you can take a suburbanite out of the suburbs, but you can’t take the suburbs out of a suburbanite.”

Shah, firmly in the millennial generation, was raised in the ‘burbs but moved to Chicago, where he founded a digital marketing firm. Although business for Shah remains in the city, he and his wife are getting ready to move to the suburbs.

“We need more space because we have a 3-year-old now,” he explains. Shah says he’s really looking forward to getting to know his neighbors and being part of a community with kids.

2. Many suburbs now offer city amenities

No kidding, ever noticed how Legacy is a clone of Dallas shops and restaurants. I was at Al Biernet’s last night — he is opening a restaurant in Frisco. Lucas and Allen are more great examples: they have a WalMart and a Starbucks in Lucas now. They couldn’t be happier. They also feel safer. Give me an 18-hour suburb, I’m getting too old for 24/7:

Enjoying urban amenities while living in the suburbs is a popular trend, according to a recent report from the Urban Land Institute.

The report calls out suburbs that incorporate urban characteristics, namely “18-hour cities.” These are not 9-to-5 work areas that shut down when the offices do, and neither are they huge 24-hour urban centers.

Instead, 18-hour cities stay alive after working hours and feature houses within walking distance of restaurants, retail, and entertainment areas.

Bonny Jones, who lives in Northern Kentucky, a suburb of Cincinnati, enjoys living in the suburbs but wants to move to one that offers more city-like amenities.

“There’s lots to do in Cincinnati, but I have to drive in awful freeway traffic to get anywhere. I would love to live in a walkable neighborhood and one with public transportation.”

Jones cites SunRail, a commuter rail transit that serves central Florida, as among the types of features — along with museums, parks, art festivals, and concerts —she desires as she considers looking for a new ‘burb to call home.

 

3. Nature, privacy, and space are appealing

We do, quite frankly, get sick of being on top of each other. I live on an acre and complain about all the work but I TREASURE not seeing another home or person when I look out my back window. How much togetherness is too much? I was out in Lucas last week — wait till I tell you that story — minimum one acre per lot and I just felt my blood pressure going down. Clean air, no sirens, ahhhh.

 Surprisingly, more people said they wanted to move to rural areas in the next five years than anywhere else. Although the overall population of rural area continues to decline while suburban and urban areas grow, U.S. Census figures do show that the rural population grew from 53.6 million in 1970 to 59.5 million in 2010.

With so many people interested in slow and local food movements and “back to land” lifestyles, it’s easy to see why today’s urbanites might consider moving to the country.

“I need nature,” says Laurie Brenner, who lives on 10 acres in the Sierra Nevada.

Brenner likes her privacy. Case in point: She could walk out on her back deck naked if she chose to, without anyone ogling. (Or even noticing.)

This is interesting, and we are going to dig into where people want to move more here on CandysDirt. Stay tuned for a story on millennials raising babies downtown, strollers, Wubbanubs and all. Stay tuned for baby boomers starting a beehive at Light Farms. I know what the experts say, but we want to know what the real people say. What we will find, I suspect, is a little bit of everything.

Or my solution: a smaller home in the city, and a condo ranch in the country.