In my 2016 book Climate-Proof Your Personal Finances I asked
Do you know a real estate agent personally?You might ask if she or he sees any signs of reduced demand in neighborhoods with some sort of water or drought risk - flooding, dropping well water, oceanfront. Although most agents don’t acknowledge this trend yet, I have talked to several who admit it’s already happening.
Climate oblivion has been the natural condition among Realtors. After all, their inventory of properties for sale is likely to be devalued if local climate risks are considered. Fortunately, American home buyers have been waking up to these risks, and the home sales industry is beginning to acknowledge this. Rising waters, extreme temperatures, and wildfires and being considered alongside great view, in-law apartment, and appliances included.
For a while now, Zillow, the home listings information service, has produced housing trend statistics, surveys of buyers, and other general reports that consider climate concerns. But two years back, their competitor Redfin started actually putting some climate risk factors into their individual property listings: fire, heat, drought and storms. Last month they added air quality.
Our house, which is not actually listed for sale, shows risks of
Flood: ‘Minimal.’
Heat: ‘Minimal.’
Wind: ‘Minimal.’
Air Quality: ‘Major.’
We weren’t shown these data when Buddy, Hilary and I moved here two years back. We had to dig them out from online databases ourselves. Today Redfin uses the scoring produced by ClimateCheck and Risk Factor, two of the sources of house-by-house risks we consulted back then.
The one-word scores are shown, but if you click for details, you are asked to start a free trial of more extensive data sources from Redfin or ClimateCheck. Yes, they’re trying to sell us detailed reports but, with just a ‘Major’ or two in a listing, Redfin has broken a long-standing barrier. Even the least knowledgeable buyer is now pushed to consider aspects of the property they would never have thought about. And if a house they are considering has risks, maybe its neighborhood is not attractive for the same reason.
Recognition of the risks to their finances, their property, and their community is what will eventually persuade more and more Americans that climate change is something to worry about - and to do something about! The blathering of experts, politicians, activists, and commentators like me takes a distant second in persuasiveness to a flooded basement, and that basement is a lot more worrisome than any amount of CO2.
Thank you, Redfin.
Many books quickly become out-of-date. But climate risks have been rising so fast in eight years that Climate-Proof Your Personal Finances is sadly up-to-date.
Zillow’s research on how much home shoppers consider climate risks is a surprise.
A house on Nantucket was listed at $2.3 million sold for $600000 because a storm took most of the lawn. Becoming an every day occurrence on the East Coast.
Thanks for the post on real estate, moving, and the climate crisis. While population shifts still seem oriented toward many of the most vulnerable cities and areas in the US (Florida, the Southwest) this is likely to reverse as people find living in flood- or fire- or drought-prone areas keeps getting worse and more and more expensive. I want to be sure you know that Abraham Lustgarten just published On the Move (Macmillan), and this book covers the issue on internal migration of Americans as the climate crisis continues. I just posted on this topic at https://davidguenette.com/its-your-move-will-rustbelt-cities-find-new-life-as-climate-migrants-look-for-home/.