West Coast Exodus
California homebuyers continue coasting into Austin's real estate market
The Californians are coming! The Californians are coming! The Californians are coming!
The new 2018 Migration Trends study by residential real estate brokerage site Redfin shows California is the top source of people from other metro areas shopping for homes in Austin.
For the study, Redfin analyzed a sample of more than 1 million online users searching for homes across 80 metro areas from July through September 2018. It then ranked metro areas for net inflow (more people seeking to move to area than leave it) and net outflow (more people seeking to leave an area than move to it).
In the Austin area, the biggest generator of inflow was San Francisco, unsurprising considering both cities are hubs for the technology sector. In Dallas, the L.A. area produced the most potential newcomers, according to the Redfin study.
Redfin found that 27.5 percent of home searches in Austin came from outside the Capital City; the same figure for Dallas was 22.5 percent.
“Rising mortgage rates are exacerbating affordability issues that have been driving people out of expensive coastal metros for the past few years,” Redfin chief economist Daryl Fairweather says in a release. “With (interest) rates no longer near historic lows, buyers are increasingly cost-conscious, seeking more affordable homes in low-tax states in the South and middle of the country.”
In the third quarter, Austin ranked seventh for the net inflow of potential new residents among the 80 regions that were studied, and DFW ranked ninth.
On the flip side of that, the Houston area ranked ninth for the net outflow of residents among the 80 areas included in the study, with Austin being the No. 1 in-state magnet and Los Angeles being the No. 1 out-of-state magnet. It’s worth noting that Houston’s net outflow for the third quarter totaled 578, compared with a net outflow of 28,143 in the San Francisco area and 14,129 in L.A.
The Redfin data shows 24.4 percent of the home shoppers in Houston were looking outside the area during the third quarter.