Migration, Job Growth Likely to Push Real Estate Prices up

The factors that drive real estate appreciation are very well known: migration, job creation, low interest rates, and accessible credit drive price appreciation as long as supply isn’t increasing equally rapidly. Over the next two years, Austin will see very strong migration and job creation in a low-interest rate environment with only small increases in the supply of housing. As a result, both rental rates and housing prices are expected to rise. In downtown Austin, where prices are already rapidly increasing, this trend should be particularly strong.

According to Employment Spectator, Austin will add more than 45,000 jobs in the next 2-years as well as 88,000 new residents swelling the metropolitan area population to more than 1.8 million by the end of 2013. Today, Apple alone announced plans to build a new $300M+ campus in Austin to hold 3,600 new employees.

According to the article, “Angelos Angelou, who published his firm’s 26th annual forecast on Thursday, the major drivers in job growth would be venture-backed startups, renovation of tech companies already functioning in the area, and a stronger real estate sector. To this would be the added the factor of immigration of skilled labor from other parts of the country infusing new blood in the local human resources pool.

Experts say that except a miss in 2009, Angelou’s economic reports for the past 26 years have been able to predict Austin’s economy with fair accuracy. The only miss of 2009 was, however, on a positive note as he predicted a job growth of only 2000 positions, while Austin outdid itself by adding 16, 000 new jobs against the prediction.

Point to note, is that Austin’s performance in employment growth has been quite poor in the last two fiscal years with a meager growth rate of 1.7 percent, while other cities in Texas had an average job growth rate of 2.3 percent. Last year, Austin added only 12, 800 jobs to the local economy.”

In addition, “The report expects a spurt in real estate activities during 2012-13 with an estimated 8, 000 new apartment units and 14, 500 single-family dwellings.
Austin’s development is also expected along entertainment industry events including the unabated growth for South by Southwest festivals, the Austin City Limits music festival, and the city’s first Formula One auto race scheduled to launch in November. According to the report, only the Formula One event can have an economic impact of an additional $500 million annually.”