Pittsboro Real Estate Agent Eric Andrews has spoken to lots of people leaving LA for NC. Most of them have researched property taxes but when they get here they’re shocked at how light the traffic is, how green everything is, the talent pool that we have here and at how affordable housing is. And a $500k house here is a lot nicer than a $1 million house in LA. Pittsboro is definitely rural living – lots of people moving from LA end up in Durham or Raleigh and then move to Chatham County once they’re finally tired of the city life.
Speaker 1: Why are people moving from Los Angeles to Chatham County?
Speaker 2: Well, we’re getting a lot of phone calls and they all have, they all have different reasons. First and foremost, I think they’re really surprised in the price difference. They’re selling small modest homes, for a million to $2 million. And then when they find out what they can get here for five or 600,000, they’re really blown away by the difference in value. So that’s one thing, the other thing has been, we’ve seen quite a bit is state income tax and property taxes. So property taxes are higher there. I just met with a couple this week, they were buying a $430,000 house. They said, what will the taxes be? I said $2,800. And they said their taxes, where they were leaving, were $22,000. So, huge, huge difference there.
Speaker 3: $22,000 on a like $10 million house?
Speaker 2: No, like a million dollar house, but still a huge difference. The state income tax is really relative. So we have people that are considering Tennessee, Texas, and Florida because of their state income tax. But then North Carolina’s not as bad as some places. And so that’s been a huge consideration. One of the funny things that we did is we look at where our buyers are coming from and I’ve always told people that Chatham county is a second move. Usually, people move to Cary, Apex, Chapel Hill, Raleigh, Durham, and then they move to Chatham county.
So when we look at our demographics, the most common is Wake county, Durham county, and then Orange County, Chapel Hill. Then one of the top counties again, was Mecklenburg County, which we were surprised about. Those were people moving from the Charlotte area. Then right on up, there was Orange County, again. And I thought it was a misprint because I saw Orange County twice, but it was Orange County, California, Los Angeles area. So, one of the neatest things that I see when we’re dealing with people from the Los Angeles area is they can’t believe how green it is in Chatham County and North Carolina. They’re just amazed by all the grass and all the trees. So, that’s something that’s much different. Then traffic and commute times are hugely important. So, we’ve had clients they’re like, well, how close is it to RTP from this farm?
And I was like, well, unfortunately, it’s 45 minutes. They’re like 45 minutes. I mean, that’s just nothing and one of the..
Speaker 3: And it’s 45 minutes of driving through rivers and [inaudible].
Speaker 2: Beautiful drives, four-lane highways, just pretty open area crossing the lake on 64. I couldn’t do the bumper to bumper and just fighting through lanes of traffic and everything. That’s just much different out here. The number one place that we’re getting calls from right now is New York. Number two, New Jersey. We’re still getting quite a bit from like Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania. We get some from Michigan, but way up there again is California. And when they’re calling from California, they’re normally calling from Los Angeles.
