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Millennials love this new housing community in a forgotten stretch of California thanks to its ultrafast internet and dirt-cheap home prices
Sam and Sydney Shwetz are millennials who became homeowners last year.
Millennials today represent 36% of homebuyers in the US.
A new housing community called New Haven, in Ontario, California, reports a millennial homeownership rate of more than 50%.
New Haven offers modest homes from $200,000 to $500,000.
California is no paragon of affordability, particularly when it comes to housing.
In five California metro areas — including San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego — the salary needed to qualify for a mortgage to buy a median-priced home is over $100,000 a year.
Homeownership in California on a typical income isn't feasible for many of today's would-be buyers, at least in the state's biggest metropolitan hubs.
In the US, millennials (generally defined as people born between 1981 and 1996) represent 36% of all homebuyers, according to the National Association of Realtors' most recent trend report. Their median income is $88,200.
As a result, millennials who want to own homes are moving to the suburbs.
"I've wanted to be a homeowner for a while — it was high on my priority list," Sam Shwetz, 25, told Business Insider.
Shwetz and his wife, Sydney, were renting in Costa Mesa, California, when they started to seriously consider becoming homeowners after Shwetz left the Army in 2016. They realized that buying in Orange County, where the median home price hovers around $714,500, was not feasible for them.
The young couple looked to the so-called Inland Empire, the large swath of desert and foothills that broadly includes Riverside and San Bernardino counties. It's the fastest-growing US metro area as measured by the number of new millennial residents, according to data from RCLCO, a real-estate-analytics company.
In a sleepy town about 35 miles east of downtown Los Angeles, called Ontario, a community named New Haven — part of Ontario Ranch, a subdevelopment spanning 8,200 acres — caught their eye.
"You have to drive through ranches and cows," Sam Shwetz said. "It's like, am I still in California?"
New Haven
It's remote, but that doesn't matter. There are parks, pools, recreation centers, new shops, and schools under construction, plus some of the fastest internet speeds in Southern California.
New Haven is a gigabit community, meaning that for $60 a month residents enjoy download speeds of 1,000 megabits per second (so it takes about six seconds to download a movie). It's great for streaming and gaming, Shwetz said.
Millennials accounted for 53% of all home sales in New Haven last year, according to Brookfield Residential, the developer and builder of the community and many others like it throughout Southern California and across the US.
For new homes, "the price range was fantastic," Shwetz said. Townhouses, condos, and single-family homes in New Haven start in the high $200,000s and top out about $500,000 — a bargain the Shwetzes couldn't pass up.
They both found new jobs in the area (he's a property manager; she's an events assistant at a university) and last October they purchased a 1,900-square-foot home in New Haven for $445,000.
After the 20% down payment, Shwetz said, they pay about $100 more a month for their mortgage payment than they were paying to rent an 800-square-foot apartment in Costa Mesa, a 45-minute drive away.
"It takes us less than an hour to get to the beach," Shwetz said. And they still attend the same church in Orange County and meet up with friends there on the weekends.
New Haven
Single-family homes in the Waverly neighborhood start in the mid-$400,000s.
Even though New Haven is a Mello-Roos district, which imposes a special tax on homeowners in new communities in California, and a $117-a-month homeowners-association fee, Shwetz said it's worth it.
Ontario Ranch won't be fully developed for another decade, at least, as it aims to house about 162,000 residents in 47,000 homes, with enough schools and retail and business space to accommodate. The Shwetzes are early adopters of sorts.
"It's a trade-off — there are not a lot of amenities yet, but there are plans to do it," Shwetz said. "In my mind, that's why housing prices are cheap, and as they build up, housing values will go up."
Millennials love this new housing community in a forgotten stretch of California thanks to its ultrafast internet and dirt-cheap home prices
Sam and Sydney Shwetz are millennials who became homeowners last year.
Millennials today represent 36% of homebuyers in the US.
A new housing community called New Haven, in Ontario, California, reports a millennial homeownership rate of more than 50%.
New Haven offers modest homes from $200,000 to $500,000.
California is no paragon of affordability, particularly when it comes to housing.
In five California metro areas — including San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego — the salary needed to qualify for a mortgage to buy a median-priced home is over $100,000 a year.
Homeownership in California on a typical income isn't feasible for many of today's would-be buyers, at least in the state's biggest metropolitan hubs.
In the US, millennials (generally defined as people born between 1981 and 1996) represent 36% of all homebuyers, according to the National Association of Realtors' most recent trend report. Their median income is $88,200.
As a result, millennials who want to own homes are moving to the suburbs.
"I've wanted to be a homeowner for a while — it was high on my priority list," Sam Shwetz, 25, told Business Insider.
Shwetz and his wife, Sydney, were renting in Costa Mesa, California, when they started to seriously consider becoming homeowners after Shwetz left the Army in 2016. They realized that buying in Orange County, where the median home price hovers around $714,500, was not feasible for them.
The young couple looked to the so-called Inland Empire, the large swath of desert and foothills that broadly includes Riverside and San Bernardino counties. It's the fastest-growing US metro area as measured by the number of new millennial residents, according to data from RCLCO, a real-estate-analytics company.
In a sleepy town about 35 miles east of downtown Los Angeles, called Ontario, a community named New Haven — part of Ontario Ranch, a subdevelopment spanning 8,200 acres — caught their eye.
"You have to drive through ranches and cows," Sam Shwetz said. "It's like, am I still in California?"
New Haven
It's remote, but that doesn't matter. There are parks, pools, recreation centers, new shops, and schools under construction, plus some of the fastest internet speeds in Southern California.
New Haven is a gigabit community, meaning that for $60 a month residents enjoy download speeds of 1,000 megabits per second (so it takes about six seconds to download a movie). It's great for streaming and gaming, Shwetz said.
Millennials accounted for 53% of all home sales in New Haven last year, according to Brookfield Residential, the developer and builder of the community and many others like it throughout Southern California and across the US.
For new homes, "the price range was fantastic," Shwetz said. Townhouses, condos, and single-family homes in New Haven start in the high $200,000s and top out about $500,000 — a bargain the Shwetzes couldn't pass up.
They both found new jobs in the area (he's a property manager; she's an events assistant at a university) and last October they purchased a 1,900-square-foot home in New Haven for $445,000.
After the 20% down payment, Shwetz said, they pay about $100 more a month for their mortgage payment than they were paying to rent an 800-square-foot apartment in Costa Mesa, a 45-minute drive away.
"It takes us less than an hour to get to the beach," Shwetz said. And they still attend the same church in Orange County and meet up with friends there on the weekends.
New Haven
Single-family homes in the Waverly neighborhood start in the mid-$400,000s.
Even though New Haven is a Mello-Roos district, which imposes a special tax on homeowners in new communities in California, and a $117-a-month homeowners-association fee, Shwetz said it's worth it.
Ontario Ranch won't be fully developed for another decade, at least, as it aims to house about 162,000 residents in 47,000 homes, with enough schools and retail and business space to accommodate. The Shwetzes are early adopters of sorts.
"It's a trade-off — there are not a lot of amenities yet, but there are plans to do it," Shwetz said. "In my mind, that's why housing prices are cheap, and as they build up, housing values will go up."
He added: "It's a pretty screaming deal."
I pass by New Haven a couple days a week on the way home from work. It's amusing how the article is presented.
Ontario certainly isn't a sleepy town nowadays. There is a large airport 15 minutes away. It used to be cow farms but for quite a few years the lots sat undeveloped until the economy turned around the last couple of years. It's just north of Eastvale, west of the 15 freeway and south of the 60 freeway. There are a lot of semi-industrial buildings surrounding Ontario Ranch. The lower cost housing are condos and townhomes. The single family homes are on very small lots. Much like what they are doing in Tustin/Irvine for "affordable" housing, but in Ontario. There is shopping just south on Limonite and the closest major mall is Ontario Mills mall.
It is admirable there is affordable housing and the location is relatively convenient. There are some high tension electrical towers which run through Ontario Ranch, so that's why at least some of the land is inexpensive. But think about this...Eastvale to the south is a relatively new city of mostly single family homes and has about 65,000 people in about 8,400 acres. They plan to put 162,000 people into Ontario Ranch in 8,200 acres. I can only imagine the traffic congestion over the next few years.
I'm glad we're leaving the area in a few months...
Last edited by Vic Romano; 04-03-2018 at 01:23 AM..
I'm a Millennial who lives in the DC area, but in a pretty "blah", out-of-the-way apartment in NoVa. The idea of getting a place in the District sounds intimidating.
I pass by New Haven a couple days a week on the way home from work. It's amusing how the article is presented.
Ontario certainly isn't a sleepy town nowadays. There is a large airport 15 minutes away. It used to be cow farms but for quite a few years the lots sat undeveloped until the economy turned around the last couple of years. It's just north of Eastvale, west of the 15 freeway and south of the 60 freeway. There are a lot of semi-industrial buildings surrounding Ontario Ranch. The lower cost housing are condos and townhomes. The single family homes are on very small lots. Much like what they are doing in Tustin/Irvine for "affordable" housing, but in Ontario. There is shopping just south on Limonite and the closest major mall is Ontario Mills mall.
It is admirable there is affordable housing and the location is relatively convenient. There are some high tension electrical towers which run through Ontario Ranch, so that's why at least some of the land is inexpensive. But think about this...Eastvale to the south is a relatively new city of mostly single family homes and has about 65,000 people in about 8,400 acres. They plan to put 162,000 people into Ontario Ranch in 8,200 acres. I can only imagine the traffic congestion over the next few years.
I'm glad we're leaving the area in a few months...
Where are you moving? Are you escaping Ca? That area is exploding with housing tracts. Nobody's considering the infrastructure of course. My sister almost bought in a big new development being built in Riverside near the Mission. Menifee is also exploding with housing.
Where are you moving? Are you escaping Ca? That area is exploding with housing tracts. Nobody's considering the infrastructure of course. My sister almost bought in a big new development being built in Riverside near the Mission. Menifee is also exploding with housing.
Yes, I'm retiring to Reno/Sparks before the end of the year. My wife doesn't like it here, she prefers smaller cities. Her relatives are mostly in the Northwest, Reno/Sparks is a midway point for where we need to visit. To me, Oregon is no haven either. I've lived in Southern California all my life and the traffic in the areas I used to live (L.A. proper) is pretty unbearable when I go into town. I don't blame her as I also am getting tired of the increased noise and traffic. Rising taxes don't help.
I've lived in my current home for 11 years and it's a pretty nice place, but all the old cow farms that have sat for a while are now getting filled in. Good for home values, hopefully it will stay that way a while longer. There continue to be improvements on the streets surrounding Ontario Ranch but whether it will be enough is very questionable. There will be a lot of 18 wheeler traffic headed towards the onramps to the 15 and 60 because of the industrial buildings.
Last edited by Vic Romano; 04-03-2018 at 02:48 PM..
No wonder the millenials are headed to the I.E...
San Bernardino County Job Growth Ahead of Orange and Los Angeles Counties
San Bernardino County has emerged as the dominant economy in Southern California. The region is adding jobs faster than the coastal counties and is the only region in CA that is adding millennials.
...
“If you are between the ages of 15 and 50, the opportunities in this County are incredible,” Robert Lovingood, chairman of the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors. “We continue to be the only region in the state that is attracting millennials, and that is a factor that is allowing us to grow and add jobs. Businesses can attract talent here.”
The I.E. is SoCal's engine of growth. OC and LA are built out, and while they are growing, they cannot compete with the I.E.'s rate of growth.
Think Silicon Valley is where the most job growth is? Nope. It's the Inland Empire
^ Re IE Job growth:
The Inland Empire also continues to mainly create low paying jobs, for So Cal and even compared to the overall US economy. Of Californians age 25 - 34, 66.4% do not have a bachelor degree, so while you are going to see college educated millennial's flocking to jobs on the coast to work in knowledge based services, non-college educated millennial's are heading inland for jobs in distribution, retail, and lower cost of living (and the actual majority of the millennial population). In SoCal you see this break down with 40% of adults 25-34 in OC having a bachelor degree, vs. only 19% in San Bernardino County for that same age range.
Of the 25 largest metro areas in the country, Riverside-San Bernardino ranks only 19th in median household income. The Inland Empire is the only metro area among the top 25 metro areas in the country without a single Fortune 500 company headquarters. You have smaller metros like Minneapolis home to companies like Target, US Bank, General Mills, 3M, Ecolab, etc... Denver homes to Level 3 Communications, Dish Network, DaVita, etc... Charlotte home to Bank of America, Lowe's Home Improvement, Nucor Steel, etc... San Antonio homes to USAA, IheartMedia, Valero Energy, etc... yet the Inland Empire with over 4.5 million people and ranking 12th in the nation doesn't have a single corporate headquarters of a public company in the top 500. Not having corporate headquarters limits career options, resume building, chances to climb the later, and gain senior management experiences. Corporate headquarters create clustering of talent, that sparks new companies and startups to follow. An experienced product manager at Target HQ in Minneapolis might go on to be a retail sales consultant, start a tech company geared toward retail, or branch off to innovate a product they think would sell in retail.
In the IE, you don't have that at a scale that matches the size of the metro. Unsurprisingly this creates an economy focused on services like fast food, retail, moving things from point A to point B, and then healthcare and government for locals as one of the few high paying jobs. This creates a cyclical effect, making it hard to attract corporate HQ's. For those working in corporate jobs it means long commutes to areas of opportunity (reflected by traffic patterns).
"The sector creating the most Inland Empire jobs in recent years is logistics. Husing says e-commerce giant Amazon already has 10 large warehouses in the Inland Empire, and is currently building more.
"When the people in L.A. go online and buy something, it is being delivered from a distribution operation and trucking operation in the Inland Empire," Husing said.
But some of the Inland Empire's fastest growing job categories — like logistics, construction, food and retail — tend to be either blue collar or low-wage. Only one in 10 new jobs pays more than $60,000 per year, many in the healthcare sector. That lags behind the high-paying job creation happening statewide. And the region has actually been losing jobs in some high-paying sectors, like government work."
Also, the BLS also found that the Inland Empire ranked 67th out of the 70 largest metro areas in the country for job growth in the "Business Services * Professional" sector, which is the highest paying sector in the American economy (law, accounting, architecture, advertising, engineering, scientific research and development, and computer systems design ). It actually posted a -6.9% decline in jobs in Business Services. It grew jobs overall though by offsetting the Business Services decline with strong growth in logistics, retail, healthcare, and construction (which were already the backbone of the IE economy). https://www.forbes.com/sites/joelkot.../#2d353aef4e9e
CLT4, excellent analysis. While a lot of growth will occur in the IE it's not the same as other metro areas. Hopefully soon, a fortune 500 company will begin and grow in the IE because it doesnt look any are moving there based on the numbers.
Stater Bros. Markets is a privately held supermarket discount chain, based in San Bernardino, California, consisting of 169 stores located throughout Southern California. ... It entered the Fortune 500 for the first time in 2006 at #493, the first notable Inland Empire-based company to do so. On September 10, 2006, the headquarters began construction of a 2,000,000-square-foot (190,000 m2) facility at San Bernardino International Airport (formerly Norton Air Force Base) from its former location on the Colton–Grand Terrace border.
I think it is still there but appears to be private rather than public.
Riverside used to have Fleetwood Enterprises, but no longer:
Fleetwood Enterprises' origins date back to 1950... In 1957, the company was reincorporated as Fleetwood Enterprises, Inc. It moved again in 1962 to Riverside, California. Fleetwood became a public company in 1965... The company became part of the Fortune 500 in 1973, remaining there for nearly three decades. By 1989, Fleetwood RVs sales reached the one billion dollar milestone; five years later, it hit the same milestone in its sales of manufactured homes.
After a series of financial difficulties in the 21st century, the company was broken up, with manufactured housing bought by Cavco Industries and RVs incorporated by a private equity firm into what became Allied Specialty Vehicles (now REV Group) which has now formed as a collective manufacturer for Fleetwood RV, American Coach, Monaco, Holiday Rambler, and Trek recreational vehicle brands.
Last edited by SportyandMisty; 04-08-2018 at 12:32 PM..
CLT4, excellent analysis. While a lot of growth will occur in the IE it's not the same as other metro areas. Hopefully soon, a fortune 500 company will begin and grow in the IE because it doesnt look any are moving there based on the numbers.
From the perspective of a site selection for a corporate HQ, the IE seems to have some positives, most of which are associated with (relatively) lower cost of land & housing and proximity to airports, but a bunch of negatives that outweigh them. The negatives are pretty well known.
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