Montgomery County - What Happened?

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12/09/2025 21:25

Subject: Montgomery County - What Happened?

quote

Anonymous

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Montgomery County had the highest median family income out of any county in America with more than 20,000 residents in the 1980s. It was close to the top in the 70s as well.

Now it’s ranked 20th, with 5 counties in NoVa in front of it. What has changed since the 1980s and can it change course?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1984/03/21/which-is-richerfairfax-and-montgomery-lead-census-bureaus-list-of-wealthiest-large-counties/48976a8b-e4cf-4aac-8c4b-a3bd43d10c92/

Fairfax and Montgomery counties, the Washington area's two most affluent suburbs, are also the two richest large counties in the nation, according to a new compilation of data by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Four county equivalents called boroughs in oil-rich and high-priced Alaska have even higher median household incomes, the bureau said, but none of them has more than 20,000 residents. The highest is Bristol Bay, Alaska--median income $33,516, population 1,094.

The rankings, published in the Census Bureau's new County and City Data Book, come from the 1980 census.
Fairfax and Montgomery were also at the top of the county income heap in the 1970 census. At that time, the rankings were compiled according to median family income and placed Montgomery slightly ahead of Fairfax.

In the new data, incomes are given for households, including not only families, which the census defines as married couples and their children living at home, but also unmarried couples, roommates and singles.

By this reckoning the median household income for Fairfax is $30,011, more than a thousand dollars above the $28,987 reported for Montgomery. However, Montgomery is still slightly ahead of Fairfax in median family income, $33,702 to $33,173

Montgomery County made it a priority to recruit the poor from other countries.

And to pander to developers who want to refine single family home neighborhoods for profit but cloak it as “attainable housing”. Thanks to Natali Fani-Gonzalez and Andrew Friedson.

As soon as my kids graduate from HS I’m out of here. And even our schools suck now.

I might leave but I’ll keep my real estate as rental income.

Even the quick and dirty ChatGPT version agrees that even though you might not want to live through it, the changes coming might support investment value.

“In most real-world markets, rents still tend to increase (or at least remain stable) even when density rises, traffic worsens, and service quality declines — but why this happens depends on several economic mechanisms:

⸻

Why rents often keep rising even when conditions worsen

1. High demand outweighs declining quality

If more people want to live in an area than there are available units, demand pressure pushes rents up even if:
• congestion increases
• services decline
• commute times rise

This is especially true in cities with strong job markets (e.g., New York, San Francisco, London).

⸻

2. Limited housing supply

If zoning rules, construction costs, or land scarcity limit new housing, the supply stays tight.
With limited supply:
• even lower-quality conditions don’t reduce rents much
• landlords know they can fill units anyway

⸻

3. Rent stickiness

Rents tend to be sticky downward, meaning they rarely fall unless something major happens:
• recession
• high vacancy rates
• population decline
• oversupply of new housing

Minor quality declines rarely cause a rent drop.

⸻

4. People pay for proximity, not comfort

In dense urban areas, people mainly pay for:
• proximity to jobs
• public transit access
• cultural amenities
• schools
• social networks

Even if day-to-day quality worsens, the location premium remains.”