Nearly Half of Remote Workers Intend To Move This Year
WFH is not only affecting the office asset class but multifamily as well.
Nearly half of all remote workers surveyed by ApartmentList say they’ll move over the next year, and four in 10 expect they’ll continue to have remote or flex work post-pandemic.
About 19% of the 5,000 US workers surveyed by the firm expect to have a hybrid arrangement allowing for WFH several days per week, while 21% say they think they’ll have the ability to work exclusively from home.
These trends are driving moving activity already, ApartmentList said in a recent analysis of the data: 19% have already moved over the last year, and 42% say they’ll move sometime over the next 12 months. Of those, 35% intend to relocate to a more affordable market, more than double the rate for on-site workers, “indicating that we may see an outflow of remote workers from the nation’s most expensive housing markets going forward,” ApartmentList notes. “This finding also highlights the important equity implications of remote work—on-site jobs are lower paid, on average, but on-site workers have less flexibility to relocate in search of more affordable housing.”
Indeed, most of the remote workers surveyed by the firm said the most important factors driving their decision making over the next several years are “access to a housing market where I can afford homeownership” and “access to natural amenities.” ApartmentList also reiterated its earlier hypothesis that “untethered workers”—remote workers unencumbered by homeownership or family obligations—“will represent the leading edge of remote work related migration trends.” Approximately 23% of the untethered workers in the firm’s survey moved over the past year and 55% will move in the coming year.
San Francisco has the highest share of untethered workers at 13.5%, followed by San Jose and cities known for high housing prices, including Los Angeles, New York City, Seattle, and Boston.
“Given that so many untethered workers are living in the nation’s most expensive housing markets, many may choose to relocate to markets where they can afford to purchase homes and raise families more comfortably,” housing economist Chris Salviati wrote in an earlier report analyzing the trend. “While such a trend would be unlikely to lead to the demise of superstar cities, it has significant potential to reshape the markets that the untethered class moves to.”