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S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

sfchronicle.com

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Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#321

Post by chiefalchemist »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #307
dominotw wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sudden drop in rents Curious, Why aren't properly prices droping to reflect the loss in population.

The loss of population is directly caused by property prices, so if they were reduced, the loss would reduce or reverse and we simply would't be talking about population loss anymore (seriously).

Yes, but probably not all. WFH has enabled those not interested in SF property to go for their property elsewhere.

It's also difficult to imagine demand increasing again and prices falling or even staying level. The issue with SF, NYC, London, etc. is sqr miles are effectively fixed and zoning limits how many residential units you can add to the market.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#322

Post by synaesthesisx »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #306
fennecfoxen wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As usual, the “speculators” and “out of towners” and others are convenient scapegoats, lest we have to face the underlying supply and demand and barriers to development. You want to have a monopoly on housing in a major city? I’d be hard pressed to point out an industry where that would be harder . You have literally millions of competitors.

San Francisco is already the second most densely populated city in the USA (the first being NYC). SF is actually already slightly more densely populated than Tokyo, which many like to tout as a mecha for de-regulated zoning.

But the difference is, NYC is constantly building new housing inventory, with constant construction and developments going up left and right.

Meanwhile most of San Francisco is just streets of old single-family homes.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#323

Post by IfOnlyYouKnew »

dominotw wrote: post #121
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually know several people who used this as an opportunity to move into the Bay Area. The sudden drop in rents made it more attractive and they jumped. They both work in industries where face to face communication is a competitive advantage. It’s easy to forget that not every job is naturally compatible with remote work like it is for those of us who type on computers all day.

> sudden drop in rents Curious, Why aren't properly prices droping to reflect the loss in population.

I don't know the answer but I do know that all the attempted answers currently posted get the basics of economics spectacularly wrong.

My money is on either this census data or property value data simply being wrong. Housing is a famously inelastic market and a 6.4 % drop in demand should lead to a double-digit decrease in rents and values.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#324

Post by [deleted] »

marvin wrote: post #270
jethro_tell wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's another more bleak option. Just like in 2008 when corporations bought up huge swaths of the housing market for cash while no one could get a loan. (which is part of the current issue with not enough homes to buy) They aren't betting the market will come roaring back, they are betting that they can corner the market and housing will be a subscription just like everything else they sell. Rent seekers aren't goin…

This is a spooky narrative, but the rent seekers can't be the majority. My understanding is that many Californian real estate markets are kept artificially tight due to various forms of NIMBYism. If renters become the majority, it's suddenly no longer viable to limit new housing through regulation. Markets are nowhere near the fundamental limits of homes per square meter of the state that's good to live in.

[deleted]

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#325

Post by IfOnlyYouKnew »

RC_ITR wrote: post #280
dominotw wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sudden drop in rents Curious, Why aren't properly prices droping to reflect the loss in population.

If everyone who left was living in a 2 bedroom with a roommate and now that space is a one bedroom with a home office, then why would rents fall?

Is the former roommate paying twice as much? If not, their rent has fallen, for statistical purposes.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#326

Post by sammalloy »

wankerrific wrote: post #315
sammalloy wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 20-30 years ago San Francisco was considered... a nightmarish hellscape. Not true in the slightest. There was little crime, you could walk everywhere safely, day or night, and the food was still incredible, and cheap. Major parts of the city were on a roadmap towards revitalization before dotcom was ever a thing. Yerba Buena Gardens was competed in 1993, for example. No disruption required. > Until the first dotcom…

I agree about the major first dotcom bringing people who didn’t care for the values and culture of the city but disagree about the roughness. The mission and the part of soma near the old trans bay terminal were pretty rough. People got mugged in broad daylight kinda rough

I was living in the Mission and working near SOMA. Never had a problem in ten years, and we would be walking to and from work and to the bars until close. There was 1% of the homelessness back then that you see now, and almost no sign of drug addiction on the streets except for a few blocks of some rough areas. The city was generally considered one of the safest to live in the country at the time, and easily affordable. Inequality changed everything, because the people who moved into the city did so to exploit its workers, its housing, and its resources. That’s when all the true creatives moved out and the bean counters and disrupters and fake privacy advocates moved in. While it’s popular to blame midwest software engineers, the true blame lies in vast swaths of old money from back east, which attempted to turn San Francisco into Manhattan, and destroy all of what made the city great to begin with. They succeeded.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#327

Post by okaram »

picture_view wrote: post #131
dominotw wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sudden drop in rents Curious, Why aren't properly prices droping to reflect the loss in population.

It’s possible most of the 6.3% did not own property and we’re not in the market to buy property, so there was no change in that market.

And I'd assume house selling is fairly elastic in the short term. If property prices go down, people would decide to wait.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#328

Post by godot »

peckrob wrote: post #19
_fat_santa wrote: post #5

I think remote work is often understated in reasons people move away. When you go into the office every day, it's pretty obvious that you have to live in whatever city you live in. But with remote work, the question becomes "if I don't have to live here, do I want to keep living here". For many (including myself), the answer was a definitive NO. Sure many headlines and news segments make it seem that it's the crime,…

I don't know why it isn't being mentioned. I am not in the Bay Area myself, but about half of my friends there have relocated in the last couple years. A bunch to Washington or Oregon, some to Texas, one to Nashville, and a few others to places mostly in the northeast. All of them cited cost of living as the primary reason ... but all also mentioned full time remote work is what finally made it possible to move. When…

I agree with you and GP; I'm just pointing out that the article does mention it as a primary reason:

> Experts have said the Bay Area’s high housing costs and remote work policies, particularly for the tech industry, fueled out-migration during the pandemic, as residents sought cheaper homes and more space. Almost all California coastal cities lost population, while the more affordable Central Valley and Inland Empire saw gains.

My observation from the discussion here is that there are a lot of people here still raving about city life (especially as pandemic tapers down) and how people are moving back in, etc. I think it's suffice to say everyone has a different living preference, and remote work enabled people who otherwise didn't want to live here, to move away, which in turn also opened up some spaces for people who wanted to live here but found it too expensive, to move in. The real question is probably how the numbers work out. Are there a lot more people who wanted to move away and are doing so now? If so, home prices and rents would drop. If the opposite is true or the numbers are about even, then prices wouldn't drop or would drop less.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#329

Post by Schnitz »

dominotw wrote: post #121
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually know several people who used this as an opportunity to move into the Bay Area. The sudden drop in rents made it more attractive and they jumped. They both work in industries where face to face communication is a competitive advantage. It’s easy to forget that not every job is naturally compatible with remote work like it is for those of us who type on computers all day.

> sudden drop in rents Curious, Why aren't properly prices droping to reflect the loss in population.

Condos did drop, single family homes did not.

Re: S.F. population fell 6.3%, most in nation, to lowest level since 2010

#330

Post by ProfessorLayton »

reducesuffering wrote: post #320
ProfessorLayton wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This map is proving my point. Even if SF is one step up from dead last, if we look at a complete year (2021) there's a HUGE difference between SF and Oakland. By comparison SF looks relatively safe, and having lived in both cities I can attest to that. The rough parts of SF are a cakewalk compared to Oakland's. Not only that, but at least in SF the roughest parts tend to be pretty concentrated to a small area. I didn…

Ya it pales in comparison to Oakland (low bar). But it's still #37 of 100 in violent crime, and is #4 highest property crime.[0] And with Oakland, it's all happening in the West and East Oakland hoods, separate from the places most people here and visitors would frequent. But with SF, it's all over the main areas of the city (obviously still somewhat concentrated in a radius around Tenderloin) where people are going…

Population: 16/100

Murder: 66/100

Rape: 67/100

Assault: 66/100

Robbery: 55/100

Theft: 2/100 (!!)

Car theft: 34/100

Outside of theft [1], SF ranks in the lower half per capita in most categories in this chart, including burglary. Of course it would be better if it was even lower, but what I see and experience, is a relatively safe city considering its population.

[1]Yes I care about theft, but my personal safety and those I care about rank much much higher than my property, and what I'd consider being "safe" in a city.

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