Baby Boomers and the Future of Real Estate

Florida Suburbs

You can forget the story line that baby boomers will be flocking to the cities for retirement. The media has overplayed it mainly because media lives in the city and can’t see the forest through the trees. Joel Kotkin writes about the decline in city population and growing smaller town population. Check out the full article here in Forbes.

Perhaps the biggest impact, however, may be on smaller metropolitan areas and the less expensive Sun Belt communities. As more boomers achieve “empty nester” status they could bring investment capital, and broader connections to smaller cities that could much use them.

One early sign of this trend may be the recent rise in migration to Florida. After a brief recession-driven hiatus a net 200,000 people have moved to Florida in the last two years. New Census numbers also suggest a large number of people continue to leave the Northeast, the Midwest and California. Also likely to benefit will be some emerging boomer magnet communities in Idaho, Arizona, Utah, the Carolinas and Colorado.

For real estate developers and investors, the ones often most entranced by the “back to the city” story, the lessons are very clear. It makes more sense to follow the numbers, and understand the logic of senior migration, than swallow the snake oil so many have been carelessly imbibing. There are great opportunities in the expanding senior market, including in some uniquely attractive urban districts, but the bigger plays are in outlying areas, and, increasingly, smaller towns.

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E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

Preparing your investments and family for when disaster strikes.

E.J. Smith is the Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH, where he completed course-work in Practical and Defensive Handgun, Conceal Carry Pistol, Shotguns, Precision Scope Rifle and Kidnapping Prevention. E.J. plays a Yamaha Recording Custom drum set with Zilldjian cymbals. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zilldjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@youngresearch.com. Sign up here to receive all the best content from Richardcyoung.com each week.