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Despite ranking high on the list of homebuyer concerns, many house hunters say they’re willing to trade safety and consider properties in high-risk areas in exchange for more affordable housing, according to a new report.
The report, released today by Redfin, found that nearly 17. 3 percent of potential homebuyers are willing to potentially sacrifice their safety if that means finding a home within their budget.
The survey compared the willingness of different age groups to relocate to neighborhoods that are less safe due to affordability. Gen Z participants who were willing to live somewhere less safe if the price was right clocked in at 23.7 percent, compared to millennials with 18.1 percent and 17.5 percent of Gen Xers.
Baby boomers appeared least willing to move to a less-safe neighborhood at 5.5 percent.
The Redfin-commissioned survey, conducted in February by Qualtrics, gathered responses from nearly 3,000 homeowners and renters about essential must-haves that would convince them to purchase a new home. Survey results indicated that participants were willing to trade off features such as the number of bedrooms and proximity to places of employment if that guaranteed affordability.
“Younger generations have come of age during a housing supply crunch, where prices are at all-time highs. Couple that with them earning less — relative to older generations — and you can see why they are willing to make more serious sacrifices to find a home they can afford,” Redfin Senior Economist Elijah de la Campa said. “When the typical household earns less than is needed to buy or rent a typical home, house hunters can’t afford not to make sacrifices.”
Despite the trade-off, safety and crime were notably among the primary causes of moving for 16.4 percent of survey participants. Gen Xers were the most sensitive to safety concerns at 20.8 percent, followed by baby boomers at 17.6 percent, millennials at 15.3 percent and Gen Zers at 12.8 percent.
When addressing safety concerns in high-risk areas, it’s crucial to consider environments prone to natural or climate disasters such as fire, flood or poor air quality. In Redfin’s survey, 28 percent of participants indicated their willingness to live in one of these environments if they were affordable.
A separate report from Redfin on Monday looked at data collected nationwide and included trends related to homebuyers moving to and from high-risk, disaster-prone environments.
High-fire-risk areas showed a total of 97,535 people moving in and 34,170 moving out. Of those moving in, 36.1 percent were moving to fire-prone Texas, up from 28.7 percent in 2022. Texas showed a net inflow of 30,156.
California’s high-fire-risk areas showed an opposite trend, with 17,357 people moving out — a net outflow of 6,937 in 2023, as opposed to 2022 when high-fire-risk counties saw a slight net inflow, up 763.
High-flood-risk counties showed 16,144 more people move in than out, fueled by a significant influx of new arrivals to Florida. However, Miami-Dade County experienced a net outflow of 47,597 people in 2023, more than almost any other county in the nation.
Florida and California are in an ongoing housing insurance crisis where homeowner premiums have skyrocketed, and some have lost coverage completely.
“Ballooning insurance costs and intensifying natural disasters are driving thousands of Americans out of risky areas, but those people are quickly being replaced by other people for whom climate change isn’t the top concern,” Redfin Senior Economist Elijah de la Campa said.
“For a lot of Americans, things like cost of living and proximity to family take precedence over catastrophe risk, which can feel less immediate and more abstract. But the cost-benefit calculus seems to be shifting in places like California and Florida, where skyrocketing home insurance costs and an uptick in high-profile disasters have had a tangible impact on residents and made national news,” de la Campa said.
Allstate, California’s sixth largest insurer, is looking to raise insurance costs by 34 percent, impacting over 350,000 people and exceeding the 30 percent hike sought by State Farm last month. The company ceased writing new homeowners policies in the state in 2022.
