82% 85% 68% 82% 85%
81% 83% 68% 81% 83%
90%
81%
82% 81% 67% 82% 81%
HOME
80%
65% 77% 81% 65% 77%
HOMEOWNERSHIP RATES BY YEAR
two-thirds of Arizonans today own their home. This is the most dramatic increase across the nation. Only Connecticut — in the sphere of two major metros with exceptionally low crime rates and top-ranked schools — came close to that rate at 6%. There, 7 in 10 residents own their homes. While 2024 rates have yet to be released for cities, data from this year’s U.S. Census American Community Survey showed a more tempered growth of Maricopa’s homeownership rate: 2% from 2021 to last year. The desert’s allure Midwesterner Chris White moved to metro Phoenix in 2014 because he needed work as a geologist. He and his wife Ann “just fell in love with Arizona.” “It’s the scenery, the desert, the weather. There’s no snow in Phoenix,” he said. White moved his family to Maricopa Meadows last August after accepting a job as chief geologist at Cactus Mine near Casa Grande. “The mine is kind of between the two cities, so we thought Maricopa would be a nice place to live,” he said, referring to Phoenix and Casa Grande. “It is much nicer than some other cities and it was more affordable. The same house in Chandler would have been $200,000 more.” Maricopa Realtor Dayv Morgan said despite its “blazing hot summers,” the city is still a hub for cold-weather refugees. “When you see all the natural calamities going on in other parts of the nation, we don’t have a lot to worry about here in the metro Phoenix area and in Maricopa,” Morgan said. As for the cost of real estate?
70%
90% 60%
80% 50%
70% 40%
68%
68%
67%
60% 30%
50% 20%
40% 10%
30% 0%
2020
2021
2022
2023
20%
Maricopa Pinal County Arizona
10%
0%
2020
2021
2022
2023
STATES WITH HIGHEST INCREASE IN HOMEOWNERSHIP SINCE 2021 Table 1 2021 2022
“We’re just the leader in affordability,” he stated bluntly. That’s the reason Craig Chojnowski and his wife Sheri retired to Glennwilde from Oceanside, Calif., in 2022. “We vacationed with friends in San Tan Valley, and we loved it. We were like, ‘We could retire over here,’” Chojnowski recalled. “Maricopa had prices we liked without overspending.” Maricopa’s economy makes it a homeownership king, according to Luis Cordova, economist and vice president of Tempe-based Rounds Consulting. Cordova pointed to cost of living and jobs growth, separating them from real estate prices. “The reason a lot of people come to Arizona is because it still is relatively inexpensive compared to most coastal states. The labor force 2020 Maricopa Pinal County Arizona Percentage State Arizona Connecticut Virginia Montana Mississippi 2020 Maricopa Pinal County Arizona
2023
Maricopa Pinal County Arizona
81% 77% 65%
83% 81% 68%
6.7% 82% 81% 67%
Table 1 ARIZONA CONNECTICUT VIRGINIA MONTANA MISSISSIPPI
6.4%
2021
2022
2023
81% 77% 65%
83% 81% 68%
81% 82% 67%
5.4%
5.3%
Alexis (right) and Sarah De La Cruz and their dog Bowie photographed in front of their Homestead home Oct. 19.
3.9%
Milk and honey For economic refugees, Maricopa represents the American Dream BY MONICA D. SPENCER
1.4%
2.8%
4.2%
5.6%
7%
Source: U.S. Census Bureau
Arizona
Connecticut
Virginia
Montana Mississippi
Table 1
1 1 More than four years after the pandemic infected the U.S. — Phoenix in 2020 was named the worst-hit city — experts agree the lifestyle changes the quarantine brought about not only led to a spike in home improvement projects and sprucing up backyards with pools, but it also led to a greater number of people telecommuting for work. 1 In the second half of 2020, roughly half of all paid work involved telecommuting compared to 5% before April that year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That number has eased to 20% in August but has continued to influence homebuying trends. Morgan said the popularity of remote work likely “gave buyers a little more confidence to purchase a home,” especially if they no longer Percentage and job opportunities have been really good, especially lately,” he said. 3.9% He said this is due to the pro-economic development stances among leaders in Arizona and in Maricopa. In sickness and in wealth A surprise contributor to the homeownership growth rate: COVID. 6.7% 6.4% 5.4% 5.3%
H
The Millers weren’t the only L.A.-area refugees to find freedom in Maricopa. Alexis De La Cruz and his wife Sarah settled in Homestead in 2021 after moving from a one- bedroom apartment in Whittier, Calif., for a job at Lucid Motors. “I feel like I’m getting to experience the American Dream,” De La Cruz said, adding the couple are first-generation Americans from Mexico and Costa Rica. “It’s liberating. It feels amazing.” It’s an Arizona thing Homeownership rates are on the rise in Arizona — more than in any other state, especially in the post-pandemic years. Since 2021, surveys by the U.S. Census Bureau’s Population Estimates Program showed the number of Arizona residents who lived in a home they owned increased 7%. More than
OMEOWNERSHIP IS A DREAM come true in the Miller household. Nearly every day since closing in August, Tyler Miller stands
somewhere in his family’s Maricopa Meadows home, looks his wife Caly in the eye and utters seven words: I can’t believe this is our house. “It’s very surreal,” Caly Miller told InMaricopa . “It really feels like home.” The couple’s move to Maricopa with their two children was the first time any of them ever left Simi Valley, Calif., where they had rented a disrepaired 60-year-old house for more than a decade. It lacked appliances and was in dire need of basic maintenance but was still worth more than twice the average single-family home in Maricopa. “The old place we moved out of could have gone for $800,000 there,” Tyler Miller said of the Los Angeles suburb.
Caly Miller
Craig and Sheri Chojnowski
InMaricopa.com | November 2024
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November 2024 | InMaricopa.com
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