After hurricanes, Florida neighborhoods see steady housing demand, wealthier residents
A new peer-reviewed study finds that, between 2000 and 2016, communities hit by hurricanes see no long-term change in housing demand—but that wealthier residents move in in the years immediately following a storm
Peer-Reviewed PublicationA new peer-reviewed study, which analyzes Florida housing markets battered by hurricanes, finds that affected areas tend to gentrify slightly in the years following a storm: the average income of new buyers increases while long-term demand stays stable.
The authors of the paper—who are based at Resources for the Future (RFF), the University of California San Diego, and the US Government Accountability Office—use data from county tax assessments, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and Zillow to gauge conditions of the housing markets and population turnover in Florida from 2000 to 2016.
The finding that housing demand didn’t decrease—and, perhaps counterintuitively, attracted wealthier inhabitants—was particularly surprising to the authors, especially given Florida’s reckoning with hurricane adaptation and resilience measures in the face of climate change.
“Hurricanes are projected to get stronger,” coauthor and RFF Fellow Yanjun (Penny) Liao said. “Our findings show that the idea that people will naturally retreat from hazardous areas may not necessarily hold up. In Florida, at least, it appears that market forces are not encouraging people to move to safer places.”
The authors find that hurricanes cause a temporary increase in home prices, likely due to the sudden decrease in housing supply from storm losses. However, they find that prices subside to baseline levels after an average of three years, which is approximately how long it takes for areas to build up housing stock to pre-storm levels. But during those pivotal three years when housing prices are higher than normal, the authors note several important tendencies:
- In the three years following a hurricane, the average income of new buyers increases proportionally to the rise in home prices. By the time prices stabilize, more than a quarter of all homes are occupied by households with a higher income than before the hurricane arrived.
- Home prices in hurricane-ravaged areas are 5 percent higher on average than unaffected ones during the three years following a hurricane. After three years, prices return to—but do not drop below—pre-storm levels.
- There is no significant change to the socio-demographic characteristics of neighborhoods after a hurricane other than income.
- Hurricanes do not fundamentally change the long-run demand for housing in affected areas.
One hypothesis for the gentrification phenomena is that wealthier households may move into communities at a higher rate following a storm because they have a greater ability to both absorb the temporary price increase and any insurance cost increases.
"In some ways, this indicates a market flaw given the current state of the climate,” said coauthor Joshua Graff Zivin of the University of California San Diego. “Policies may be needed to ensure that these communities have strong adaptation and mitigation measures in place to deal with future storms.”
The findings in this study are something that the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) and federal disaster assistance programs could find useful. Gentrification in Florida could lead to higher post-hurricane insurance claims from the NFIP, which could place a heavier burden on federal taxpayers, who back the program. In addition, federal spending in disaster assistance could also increase as a result.
The authors note that future research should examine the equity implications of post-hurricane housing markets, particularly in the context of fluctuating housing prices and options available to lower income buyers and renters in the years following a hurricane.
For more, read the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management article, “How Hurricanes Sweep Up Housing Markets: Evidence from Florida,” by Joshua Graff Zivin of the University of California San Diego, Yanjun (Penny) Liao of Resources for the Future, and Yann Panassié of the US Government Accountability Office.
JOURNAL
Journal of Environmental Economics and Management
METHOD OF RESEARCH
Data/statistical analysis
SUBJECT OF RESEARCH
Not applicable
ARTICLE TITLE
How hurricanes sweep up housing markets: Evidence from Florida
Disaster-related trauma disproportionately affects individuals who are older and less educated—and higher income
A new study has found that these vulnerable populations are more likely to experience physical and mental functional limitations following severe weather events that lead to traumatic consequences, such as losing a home.
Peer-Reviewed PublicationMajor weather events such as last month’s 6.4 magnitude California earthquake, tornados in Louisiana, and a “once-in-a-generation” multi-state winter storm caused major damage to homes across the US and disrupted daily lives. As climate experts predict these natural disasters will continue to increase in severity and frequency, a new study led by a School of Public Health researcher is shedding new insight on the adverse health impacts that certain vulnerable populations experience following the loss of a home due to severe weather damage.
Published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, the study found that individuals from disadvantaged backgrounds disproportionately experience disaster-related home loss—and that they are more likely to be severely affected by home loss, namely by developing physical and mental functional limitations in the years after they lose their home.
The first-of-its-kind study builds upon previous research that has focused only on population-average data of home loss and adverse health effects; the new study identifies subgroups of vulnerable populations who are more likely to be severely affected by this traumatic experience. These include people who are older, not married, living alone, less educated, and unemployed, as well as those who had health problems prior to the losing their home.
The researchers say that identifying populations at exceptionally high risk of post-disaster functional impairment may better inform resource allocation during disaster mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery efforts at the local and federal level.
“Our study moved beyond the traditional finding on population-average effects and identified complex effect heterogeneity,” says study lead and corresponding author Dr. Koichiro Shiba, assistant professor of epidemiology at Boston University School of Public Health. “These results help policymakers by providing insights on the impacts that disaster damages may have on health disparities, which analysis of population-average effects ignores. The results can also be used to identify which subpopulations need to be prioritized in post-disaster public health supports.”
For the study, Dr. Shiba and colleagues used machine learning methods to identify variations in the association between disaster-related trauma and functional limitations among a group of older survivors of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. The 9.1-magnitude earthquake and 40-meter tsunami killed nearly 16,000 people and rendered more than 450,000 people homeless. The team used pre- and post-disaster survey data from the Iwanuma Study, part of a larger nationwide study of the living conditions of Japanese older adults, to measure individuals’ functional limitations in 2013 and 2016 based on three indicators: standardized assessments of physical disability (such as whether someone can turn over in bed independently); the ability to accomplish daily activities independently (such as walking, bathing, going to the bathroom); and higher-level functional capacities (such as using public transportation).
The researchers found that individuals experiencing more severe functional limitations after home loss tended to have less education and more pre-disaster health problems, such as depression. But notably, they also found that these individuals had higher income prior to losing their home.
One speculation for this finding could be explained by status inconsistency – “where different aspects of social status contradict with each other and potentially magnify the adverse impacts of disaster-related home loss,” Shiba explains. Previous studies have shown that higher-income people are also more likely to engage in excessive drinking, which could lead to limited functioning. Another explanation, he says, is that “instead of moving to a temporary housing village with other survivors, richer people might have been able to afford and relocate to private housing after home loss, which could result in loss of pre-existing social capital and support.”
Understanding these underlying mechanisms resulting from home loss and other traumatic experiences will help inform more targeted public health interventions following the inevitable occurrence of future severe weather events, he says.
JOURNAL
American Journal of Epidemiology
METHOD OF RESEARCH
Data/statistical analysis
SUBJECT OF RESEARCH
People
ARTICLE TITLE
Uncovering heterogeneous associations of disaster-related traumatic experiences with subsequent mental health problems: A machine learning approach
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