The residential real estate market has had what may be its biggest price run-up in history. According to the S&P Case-Shiller home price index, national home prices have risen about 20% year over year in most months of 2022.
Home prices have risen sharply for two specific reasons. The first is that mortgage rates dropped to 3% for a 30-year fixed loan last year. (Those days are over. Mortgage rates are now close to 6%).
Another reason for home price movement is America’s newfound mobility. People have been able to move because millions now work from home. The COVID-19 pandemic shuttered most business locations. Americans have been able to go from where they have to live for work to where they want to live for lifestyle reasons.
Some large portion of the American migration has been driven by the cost of living. The country’s largest coastal cities like New York and San Francisco have home prices more than double the national average. Many people have left these cities. Medium-sized cities inland have “reasonable” home prices and are often not nearly as crowded.
One aspect of relocation is moving costs. These are not uniform across the country by any means. “Hire A Helper” recently released a study titled “2022 Study: This Is the Most Expensive Year in History To Move”. It includes cities and states by moving costs and how they have changed from 2021 to 2022.
The primary conclusion of the study was that “In the first five months of 2022, moving costs reached an average of $394, which is 9% higher than they were in the same period last year.” The figure, the authors wrote, could reach $454 by the end of the summer.
Hire A Helper used its own data on moving, based on its business activity. Cities with under 100 moves were not included.
The city in which moving costs rose the most over the period was Columbia, S.C. Moving costs in the city rose 42% year over year. It was followed by Seattle with an increase of 39%. Moving costs rose 37% in Colorado Springs and Salt Lake City.
The city where moving costs fell the most was Rochester, N.Y., where they dropped 25%.
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