People aren’t leaving CA in droves… at least according to the United Van Lines survey

[spdrun]

No state except Michigan has actually seen a decrease in population from 2000 to 2010. California is pretty much mid-pack. This isn’t a BAD thing, BTW — sudden growth leads to a lot of problems.

http://www.indexmundi.com/facts/united-states/quick-facts/all-states/population-growth#chart

[EconProf]

While it is true that our state’s population growth in the decade to 2010 puts us about in the middle of all states, it is due largely to our higher than average birth rate, and our status as destination for immigrants, legal and illegal. Take away those factors and we have a clear net outflow of people to other states.
Plus, the decade 2001 to 2010 is old data. The exodus of people has probably accelerated since our unemployment rate 2010 to 2013 has been greater than most other states.

[no_such_reality]

[quote=bearishgurl]
This is all due to rampant CFD formation, approved by its short-sighted, greedy and incompetent leaders mostly in the last decade. RIV Co has turned from an agriculture and military-based county (self-sustaining) into a megalopolis bedroom community with few jobs which pay enough for rent/mortgage.
[/quote]

No, BG,it is a 30%+ legal population growth and probably a 50% pop growth when counting illegal.

That’s since 1990.

[spdrun]

While it is true that our state’s population growth in the decade to 2010 puts us about in the middle of all states, it is due largely to our higher than average birth rate, and our status as destination for immigrants, legal and illegal.

Why are immigrants any less valid than people moving to the state from within the US? My parents were immigrants. Most friends of the family were in the same boat (no pun intended). They worked damn hard and never were a drag upon the government.

[EconProf]

Of course immigrants are just as valid. But this discussion is about whether people are moving into or out of CA vis-a-vis other states.
My point was that a state’s population growth or lack of it is the product of other factors as well, such as immigration and birth rates. Those factors are high for CA, which offsets the net out-migration of Californians to other states. People are leaving in droves, so let’s address the problems causing this.
Incidentally, we need those immigrants and fertile families to offset the plunging birth rate. Social security and medicare are doomed given present trends. Only a growing economy and growing population can bail these programs out.

[spdrun]

Fact is that CA has a net influx of people. It actually speaks very well to it that people even come from ABROAD to settle there. Think of it as a country with the 8th or 9th biggest economy in the world, that made an unfortunate mistake in joining the rest of the USA in 1849.

[SK in CV]

[quote=EconProf]Of course immigrants are just as valid. But this discussion is about whether people are moving into or out of CA vis-a-vis other states.
My point was that a state’s population growth or lack of it is the product of other factors as well, such as immigration and birth rates. Those factors are high for CA, which offsets the net out-migration of Californians to other states. People are leaving in droves, so let’s address the problems causing this.
Incidentally, we need those immigrants and fertile families to offset the plunging birth rate. Social security and medicare are doomed given present trends. Only a growing economy and growing population can bail these programs out.[/quote]

People are no longer leaving the state in droves. At least in 2011 it was roughly 6 leaving for every 5 moving in. (link previously provided) Given that California lead the country in new job creation which was proportionally almost double the rest of the country in 2012, I suspect 2012 will be an even lower ratio of out-migration, maybe even reversing the trend. Rising real estate prices may stop that trend dead in its tracks.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=no_such_reality][quote=bearishgurl]
This is all due to rampant CFD formation, approved by its short-sighted, greedy and incompetent leaders mostly in the last decade. RIV Co has turned from an agriculture and military-based county (self-sustaining) into a megalopolis bedroom community with few jobs which pay enough for rent/mortgage.
[/quote]

No, BG,it is a 30%+ legal population growth and probably a 50% pop growth when counting illegal.

That’s since 1990.[/quote]

nsr, re: RIV Co, it is a classic case of the “chicken and the egg syndrome.” All that influx of hundreds of thousands of people would never have moved in there were it not for the abundance of cheap tract housing. In 1990, the bases were still very much alive but it didn’t have too much more “redeeming qualities” except tourism in select spots (Palm Sprs, La Quinta) and the same is true today. That “new population influx” didn’t move to Palm Sprs or La Quinta or more established areas such as Redlands and Riverside. They moved to SE RIV county where all the new construction was. Had these CFD’s never been formed, this population would have just stayed their working-class established communities in SD County or Corona, Downey, Hawaiian Gardens, Anaheim or Vernon, for example.

RIV Co’s original “new construction buyers” in the early-mid nineties displaced existing CA homes/rental units, either by selling them, renting them out or leaving their landlords to find new tenants. Very, very few of them moved in from out of state.

Sorry, but SE RIV County is not exactly what residents of other states (who can afford to move their families to CA) dream about. IOW, they don’t sit on the porch swing of their 3000+ ft spread in TX and say, “Hey, let’s pack up and move to Moreno Valley (or Menifee), CA! I heard it’s a “happening place” and they have thousands of brand new homes eight feet apart and this special tax called “Mello Roos” which gives them new roads connecting them from the middle of nowhere to civilization. And it’s only 75 mi or ~3 hours from the `beach!’ Let’s head on out there and take a look …. we’ll stop at the Grand Cyn on the way back!”

It just didn’t happen that way. The Riv Co influx was an organic displacement of families in phases over many years from neighboring, higher-priced counties. These families realized (thru radio and billboards targeted specifically to these communities) that new construction could be had at an “affordable” price which either did not exist in their built-out, established communities or if it did, it was prohibitively expensive.

And, as we all know, we get exactly what we pay for in this life. After moving from their “hometowns” to SE RIV Co, their mtg/rent bill went down $500 mo and their gasoline bill went up $500 (not taking into acct tires/auto repairs or their time spent commuting). I’m sure after a year of living in the IE, their old 1500 sf digs in Montebello was starting to look good to many of them :=0

Those “illegals” you speak of were “put up” in trailers and manufactured homes on the properties of their employers OR living with legal-resident relatives locally with no leases or utility bills in their names …. yes in 1990 AND today. They can’t get mortgages and they can’t very easily rent in their own names. So, CA doesn’t need to “project” enough housing for its “illegal population.” They either find a way to survive here thru “sponsors” or go home.

The vast majority of foreign RE buyers in CA using all cash have a legal right to be in this country (even if “temporary”).

[paramount]

[quote=bearishgurl]

Sorry, but SE RIV County is not exactly what residents of other states (who can afford to move their families to CA) dream about. IOW, they don’t sit on the porch swing of their 3000+ ft spread in TX and say, “Hey, let’s pack up and move to Moreno Valley (or Menifee), CA!

The vast majority of foreign RE buyers in CA using all cash have a legal right to be in this country (even if “temporary”).[/quote]

You’re so right BG, and do these “Valley of the Dirt People” even deserve to call themselves Californian’s?

I’m sure that after watching a Baywatch Marathon – these same people were definitely dreaming about moving to Clairmont – woo hoo!!

[no_such_reality]

[quote=bearishgurl]
nsr, re: RIV Co, it is a classic case of the “chicken and the egg syndrome.” All that influx of hundreds of thousands of people would never have moved in there were it not for the abundance of cheap tract housing. In 1990, the bases were still very much alive but it didn’t have too much more “redeeming qualities” except tourism in select spots (Palm Sprs, La Quinta) .[/quote]

Well, I came in the 90s.

Nothing about CA housing was cheap comparatively, even at the bottom of the cycle in the 90s.

The CFDs didn’t cause the population boom. The California mystique did. It takes a few years for the reality versus mystique gap to become annoying.

Then those people flitter back when they realize the California they thought and the California that is, are two very different places. Meanwhile, Cali is importing poverty in droves.

[SK in CV]

[quote=no_such_reality]
Then those people flitter back when they realize the California they thought and the California that is, are two very different places. Meanwhile, Cali is importing poverty in droves.[/quote]

I don’t think there’s any evidence that California is importing poverty in any great numbers.

[no_such_reality]

http://www.usc.edu/schools/price/research/popdynamics/pdf/2011_Myers-etal_California-Roller-Coaster.pdf

Figure 4 agrees with you. Does that count all people or just legal residents?

[bearishgurl]

[quote=no_such_reality]http://www.usc.edu/schools/price/research/popdynamics/pdf/2011_Myers-etal_California-Roller-Coaster.pdf

Figure 4 agrees with you. Does that count all people or just legal residents?[/quote]

I printed out this interesting USC study and will look it over tonight.

Figure 4 also indicates the “poverty rate” of LA County dropped after about 2003. Where did many of LA’s longtime “poor” go?

They moved just 30-50 miles to RIV and SB Counties where they were “lured” by “cheap” new construction, which they “miraculously qualified” to buy with sub-prime mortgages.

That’s my premise. Big Development successfully “lured” SoCal’s “poor” and “lifetime renters” into the IE with billboards and TV/Radio advertising.

All this “LA County exodus” really did was “redistribute” some of the poverty in CA. It didn’t cause “poor people” to move in from elsewhere.

Not only do more affluent cities in CA disallow billboards, their residents had no need to move to RIV or SB County. Most already had a suitable home in a much better location.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=no_such_reality][quote=bearishgurl]
nsr, re: RIV Co, it is a classic case of the “chicken and the egg syndrome.” All that influx of hundreds of thousands of people would never have moved in there were it not for the abundance of cheap tract housing. In 1990, the bases were still very much alive but it didn’t have too much more “redeeming qualities” except tourism in select spots (Palm Sprs, La Quinta) .[/quote]

Well, I came in the 90s.

Nothing about CA housing was cheap comparatively, even at the bottom of the cycle in the 90s.

The CFDs didn’t cause the population boom. The California mystique did. It takes a few years for the reality versus mystique gap to become annoying.

Then those people flitter back when they realize the California they thought and the California that is, are two very different places. Meanwhile, Cali is importing poverty in droves.[/quote]

nsr, this “CA mystique” you talk about has been going on since the dawn of time. However, to non-residents, it only applies to “SF, Hollywood or SoCal beaches.”

Those three things are mostly what comes to mind when non-residents think of CA.

None of them are located within CFD’s.

The formation of the (now heavily-distressed) CFD’s (which were located at least 30 mi away from work centers) had the effect of redistributing poverty in CA from urban to exurban. In addition, it caused many enlisted military families (some non-residents) to decide to buy homes (to their detriment) when they could have instead availed themselves of military housing or taken the gov’t’s rental allowances on their paychecks. It also caused many longtime urban and suburban renters to buy houses who had no business becoming homeowners.

The development inside these distant CFD’s didn’t cause the longtime CA rural resident or non-resident to suddenly decide to move into them.

I have no doubt that many thousands who lost their homes in the IE DID “flitter back” to rent in their old ‘hoods in LA, Orange and SD Counties as the “commuting grind” had taken its toll on them by then.

Had the CFD’s never been formed, there would have been less rental vacancy and less on the market at any given time in CA’s populous counties (since their open space was preserved by their PTB).

Yes, SOME non-resident families would not have accepted jobs in CA because they couldn’t buy a *new* house. But that doesn’t mean CA “lost” a “taxpaying” resident as there are PLENTY of well-qualified locals EVERYWHERE in CA to take these jobs. If the CFD Act did not exist, SoCal counties would have been more like the Silicon Valley peninsula counties of SM Co and the northern part of SC Co, where there has been no room for subdivisions in the last 3+ decades, excepting Foster City (dredged out of the bay). Thus, the prices would have ALWAYS been higher for existing properties. And CA cities would not have had to file for BK because they wouldn’t have hired hundreds of extra employees in the first place!

Any boom/bust cycles would have been caused purely by greater US economic factors and would have been very short-lived, IMO.

Cali doesn’t need to “import poverty” and is not doing so. It already has enough homegrown (legal US-resident) poverty. Today’s “poverty” in the US and Cali is heavily disguised in Section 8 vouchers, free school lunches, Medi-Cal and CMS, Healthy Families, WIC, EBT cards, “lifeline” cell-phone plans, Head Start, DASH, 6 to 6 programs, private school discounts, etc, etc.

“Illegal” US residents are ineligible for these services.

Unlike in past generations, it is no longer very easy to determine who the “poor” actually are when out in public.

[bearishgurl]

Honestly, I know it won’t happen, but should CA have a major contraction in population and some of these distant CFD’s turned into “ghost towns” (which were boarded up and their utilities shut off), it would be better for the state’s environment and economy overall.

[Author]

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