Reply to The Pandemic Hit Cities Hard And Then There's Washington, DC

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[quote=Anonymous]I've read this entire thread, and what leaps off the screen to me is this: None of you actually lives downtown.

Well, I do -- and I have since Sharon Pratt Kelly was the mayor while Marion Barry was "on vacation."  And when I mean, "downtown," I mean, walk out the back entrance of my apartment building, take two big steps to the corner, and with a really good throw, get a tennis ball to land, bounce, bounce, bounce, and come to a stop in the newly-reopened Franklin Park.

So, with that, stop with all the downtown is a ghost town nonsense.  It's not.  Last spring, that was a ghost town.  There's pedestrian and vehicular traffic again.  I can't just stroll across Connecticut Avenue anymore without looking.  (Because I walk to work downtown.  Yes, I go to the office.  Regularly.  Never stopped, actually.)  I could do that through last September.  No more.  Yes, bars have closed, but the buffet that caters to the business lunchtime crowd is open.  (I went today.  Yes, I know, OMG!!!!  Buffets during COVID.  Yeah, well, I went on the Metro, too.  And I'm going to a bar tonight.)  Even the hot dog vendor is back.  In terms of activity, I would say things are about 60% of what they were downtown.  Not dead, but certainly not what it used to be.

As for the rental market, my apartment building is fairly nice by Washington standards.  We have a pool, a gym, a parking garage, and bugs every flippin' summer.  This place cleared out late spring last year.  Easily forty percent vacant at its peak.  All the kids went home, either because of school or because they could telework and live more cheaply back home.  And it wasn't just my building.  Up and down the street, buildings were offering crazy promotions to entice new tenants.  I should know: I moved to another apartment within my building and got months of free rent and parking and below-market rent.

Today, the kids have returned, but not all of them.  The childless married folks, they stayed.  The childless singletons, they're mostly back home.  Maybe, for good.  Yes, restaurants are open and there's stuff to do, but winter is a-coming.  Who wants to huddle outside with more restrictions when there aren't any back in Ohio?  Who wants to wear a mask inside all the damn time?  Don't have to do that in Virginia . . . .

Landlords are caught in a tough spot.  That housing deficit yadda yadda?  That does not apply downtown.  There are plenty of vacancies.  Landlords desperately need tenants, but being honest here, rent payments are kinda voluntary, and everyone knows it.  Evictions aren't coming out of landlord-tenant court anytime soon.  (Forget that December lifting of the stay.  That's totally being extended.)

I'll just leave this here and let all y'all in Upper Northwest keep talking about my neighborhood.  It's really entertaining.[/quote]

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