Moving Words – Exodus
Timothy Brady
“There’s a reason the Exodus story has inspired so many Americans. It’s a narrative of hope.” – Bruce Feiler
2020 will go down in the history books as the year that whatever was expected – didn’t occur. The moving business has been impacted in multiple ways. However, the most unexpected result has been the increase in families and individuals leaving large metropolitan areas for less-crowded suburbs or rural areas.
As The New York Times printed this August: “From professionals who are downsizing following a job loss, to students moving back in with their parents, to families fleeing the city for the suburbs, people are changing their addresses in droves.”The Times checked with FlatRate Moving, whose spokesperson said the number of moves had increased more than 46 percent between March 15 and August 15 compared with last year’s number. Consumers moving outside New York City are up 50 percent. Dutchess County logged an almost 232 percent increase, while Ulster County, Hudson Valley, gained a 116 percent increase.
And Metropolis Moving, Brooklyn, owner Matt Jahn said, “We are turning people away because we just don’t have the capacity. “Normally, in a given summer, we spend a bunch on advertising. But we cut it this year because we couldn’t afford it. And we have still had amazing demand.” In mid-March, when the grim realities of Covid-19 became clear, moving companies had no idea what to expect so they figured on a slow season. Were they going to be considered an essential service? or need to close down? However, as soon as movers were listed as ‘essential,’ phones lit up with people wanting to schedule a move. And not just NYC saw an outgoing flood. The Westchester & Fairfield County Business Journals said New York and Connecticut were among the top states with pandemic-era outbound migration. Vermont was one of the highest inbound states during March through August, 2020. Marc Rogers, CEO of UniGroup, said in a video interview with Yahoo Finance ‘The First Trade’: “We are starting to see that movement and a lot of things happening for consumers as they’re making decisions quite a bit driven by the pandemic. We’ve started to ask the question we’ve always asked, ‘Why are you moving, but specifically, is COVID driving that?’ We’re seeing over 10% of our consumers are making the decision to move because of the pandemic.”Queried about the corporate side, Rogers responded, “We’ve actually seen the corporate side really soften, and I think a lot of people asking the question of when should we go back to the office, and can I keep working from home? And that’s actually driving a lot of the volume that we’re seeing is people making a decision as companies make that decision to not come back into the office, to go ahead and make a move and maybe live in a location that they’ve always wanted to live or live closer to family. But on the corporate side, we’re still very soft, off about 30% from last year compared to the direct consumer side, which is where we’re really seeing that demand.”
When asked what migrating trends are developing as we move through the pandemic, Rogers said, “We’ve absolutely seen a lot of movement to less populated states, I guess, is a good way to say that. We keep track of that each year with our United study. And in that top 10, we’ve really seen where people are moving is to less populated states. So Idaho, South Carolina, Tennessee, a lot in the southeast, although there’s still huge demand to go to Florida.”
While time and a working vaccine will be the final decision maker on how these new migration trends will impact the moving industry, it can be said as a whole, with all the challenges of protecting moving crews from COVID-19 to the increase in the number of moves for the 2020 peak season that outdid expectations, this will be a year to remember.
“I been a long time leaving but I’m going to be a long time gone.” – Willie Nelson
