An increasing percentage of homebuyers and sellers wouldn’t be hesitant about moving to an area where most residents have differing political views, according to a report from Redfin.
The report found 38 percent of homebuyers and sellers would be hesitant about moving to an area where most residents have differing political views, down from 41 percent in 2017 and 42 percent in 2016.
Additionally, respondents said they’d be more open to moving to a place where they’d be in the racial, ethnic or religious minority, with only 22 percent saying they’d be hesitant about it. The report was based on a survey of more than 3,000 U.S. residents who bought or sold a primary residence last year.
“This decade’s tumultuous political climate has widened the aisle between parties not only in Congress and the voting booth, but in our nation’s communities,” Redfin Chief Economist Daryl Fairweather said in a release. “While the share of homebuyers and sellers who hesitate about moving to a place where most people have different ideologies has been declining, I imagine tensions will start to flare again as we head into the 2020 election year.
“As more people — especially young professionals — head inland from blue coastal cities seeking affordability in smaller inland metros, it’s likely they will seek out communities where they’ll live, work and send their kids to school with like-minded people. We expect to see red places in the middle of the country become redder and the blues bluer as the migration trends we’ve been reporting continue.”
According to the report, 16 percent of respondents said they would be enthusiastic about moving to an area where most residents have differing political views, a notable increase from 9 percent in 2017 and 8 percent in 2016.
Redfin found that nearly half of homebuyers and sellers — 46 percent — said they would be neutral about moving to an area where most residents have differing political views.
Broken down by race, Redfin said 40 percent of white homebuyers and sellers said they’d be hesitant about moving to an area where most residents have different political views, a higher share than any other racial group. Black and African-American respondents were most likely to be enthusiastic at the prospect (22 percent reported enthusiasm, versus 14 percent of white respondents).