Amazon’s Impact on the Housing Market

The heralded HQ2 by Amazon has not yet broken ground in the northern parts of Virginia. But is said that the impending opening has turned the housing market in the local limits to go awry. Michelle Doherty, one of the real estate agent focusing on South Arlington, has said that she got more calls when the announcement was made that she had in an entire month. The report by the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors as well as the George Mason University Center for Regional Analysis has shown that median home prices in Arlington Country have increased by 17.2% in June 2019 by the end of the year.

Amazon had announced the location of HQ2 to be in National Landing including cities like Crystal City, Pentagon City and Alexandria, suburbs of Washington in November. They intend to make 25,000 hires in the coming decade. Though not yet opened, by 2019, at least 400 employees will be working there, and the number will go up to 1000 in 2020, and 1500 in 2021. Arlington is already a posh enough neighborhood in Virginia because of being an extension suburb of Washington DC, and many residents are wary of the progress.

Arlington gaining 25000 jobs is going to become difficult for those who do not already have high paying jobs according to a board member of the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors, Christine Richardson. Virginia is not the only market with growth on the horizon, though. The CoreLogic Home Price Index has shown that 3.6% increase has been seen in the last year, completed in May 2019. The report forecasts that prices will increase by 5.6% by May 2020.

Homes which are priced lower have seen an annual ascend of 5.4% in rates whereas the middle tier ones have seen an ascend of 4.5%. Middle to moderately priced homes have only seen an increase of 4%, and those which were already priced highly have only docked a 3% increase.