Nearly half of Bay Area residents believe they’ll likely move out of the region in the next few years, despite most feeling like they belong there, a new survey found.
In a poll released this week by Embold Research for Joint Venture Silicon Valley and the Bay Area News Group, 46% of the 1,801 adults surveyed said they’re feeling forced to leave the pricey California region — up from 43% last year.
Of the those likely to leave, 66% said they felt like they still belonged in their communities.
“What they’re concerned about is our inability to solve our basic problem, which is housing — housing and the high cost of living here,” Russell Hancock, president and CEO of regional think-tank Joint Venture Silicon Valley, told the news group. “That’s what’s driving people out.”
Electrician David Collins, 53, told the news group that he’s in love with the nature of the Bay Area, where his family has lived for five generations. Still, he said he can’t afford to stick around.
“I’d love to stay. I worked seven days a week trying to save money to buy a house, and it just kept being unattainable,” he said. “How am I going to retire?”
Renters in the Bay Area were more likely to leave compared to homeowners, according to the poll.
Gina Bidinger, 59, lives in a $2,600-per-month, two-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment in Alameda with an adult daughter and 76-year-old mother. She said she was shocked by the much cheaper housing prices in states like Nevada and Texas, including a six-bedroom, four-bathroom house for $300,000.
“It’s a little hard to make that decision to move out of California, because this is really all I’ve ever known,” Bidinger told the news group. “The only thing that really holds me back is my children that are here.”
Outside of affordability, politics is another factor pulling Bay Area residents from the region, according to the poll. Some said that policies such as the proposed billionaires tax or sanctuary city laws have frustrated them.
Last month, San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie declared a “rent emergency” and proposed several actions to combat evictions amid shocking headlines of rents in the city hitting more than $5,000 for one-bedroom apartments.
“The Bay Area is home to some of the fastest increases in rent and also some of the highest home prices in the US,” Realtor.com Chief Economist Danielle Hale told the California Post.
“Housing costs are often the largest budget item for families, and making a move that brings down the cost of housing can create meaningful breathing room when budgets are stretched.”
A study released this month ranked San Francisco 43 out of 44 on a list of cities where renters have the most negotiating power.
The city earned an “F” grade in the ranking, with median rent for a 1-bedroom apartment spiking 21.9% in a year to $4,060 — the highest of any market, according to rental property platform Zumper.
According to Apartment List, the apartment vacancy rate in the city fell to just 2% in August, while rent prices have skyrocketed 26% in the past year.
“This leads the nation and represents the fastest post-pandemic rent growth captured by our model,” the Apartment List analysis said.
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