Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The largest employer in DC is restructuring to cut the workforce by half. The largest employer is also the largest leaseholder and also announced giving up millions of square feet of commercial space.
Idk if people just have their heads in the sand because they’re used to stability in this sector or if this is some form of hyper normalization to keep things steady - but I can’t fathom how wholesale RIFs and closures doesn’t hurt the DC market.
There is no other industry in this market to take the place of gov. Even GSK / pharma /life sci - which MoCo has hung their hats on - has waned and announced departures.

The issue is that for years people have said DC real estate can never drop and that it’s not like other locations.

Except black swan events do occur. The fires in Pacific Palisades, 9/11 and now, a huge reduction in the federal workforce. No place is immune and diversification is important. Whenever someone tells you that something can never be affected you should question it.

Who said prices would never drop and that DC is insulated? Prices did slump in DC metro during every recession. In DC proper markets are very local and dependent on what's around. Some areas just stagnated, while others went up 2x in price. And I think comparing this situation to natural disasters that wipe out entire towns is weird and it's not something anyone can predict or be shielded from regardless where they live.

Anonymous wrote:The largest employer in DC is restructuring to cut the workforce by half. The largest employer is also the largest leaseholder and also announced giving up millions of square feet of commercial space.
Idk if people just have their heads in the sand because they’re used to stability in this sector or if this is some form of hyper normalization to keep things steady - but I can’t fathom how wholesale RIFs and closures doesn’t hurt the DC market.
There is no other industry in this market to take the place of gov. Even GSK / pharma /life sci - which MoCo has hung their hats on - has waned and announced departures.

These aren't the reasons. The main reason is that the entire situation is unstable and this goes beyond DC metro. Because DC powers change every few years whatever happens now is not indicative of what happens forever. unless the entire capital is moved out of DC and everything closed people aren't going to panic en masse (panic will be individual circumstance based). We also only hear about cutting jobs and discontinuing contracts and closing agencies. The restructure or re-org part hasn't happened and isn't talked about. The news are only negative, so there is nothing to add to it. The only unknown is about re-hiring and job creation.

Yes, the area may lose a lot of jobs, which would be comparable to some banking heavy areas in 2008 when half of the banking related and adjacent jobs disappeared, I lived through this being in an industry at that time with both of us unemployed for an extended time. It turned around in 2 years and prices that slumped a bit had gone up again.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The largest employer in DC is restructuring to cut the workforce by half. The largest employer is also the largest leaseholder and also announced giving up millions of square feet of commercial space.
Idk if people just have their heads in the sand because they’re used to stability in this sector or if this is some form of hyper normalization to keep things steady - but I can’t fathom how wholesale RIFs and closures doesn’t hurt the DC market.
There is no other industry in this market to take the place of gov. Even GSK / pharma /life sci - which MoCo has hung their hats on - has waned and announced departures.

The issue is that for years people have said DC real estate can never drop and that it’s not like other locations.

Except black swan events do occur. The fires in Pacific Palisades, 9/11 and now, a huge reduction in the federal workforce. No place is immune and diversification is important. Whenever someone tells you that something can never be affected you should question it.

DOGE has a target to cut 75% of federal workers, not half. Already 10,000 are on admin leave or fired. And those workers are a small subset of the federal contractors, businesses and vendors who depend on government spending. Anyone saying this isn't a disaster for the DMV area isn't paying attention.

Between weather concerns - wildfires/floods/etc. and rates still hover around 7%, where are you all going exactly that's going to be that much less than your current mortgage? I think that's been the biggest driver of low inventory everywhere. I would LOVE to leave this area but it's impossible to find another location that makes sense.

A family of 4, we pay roughly $1800k month for a 4BR/4 BA 3000 sq ft+ SFH located in a desirable neighborhood! I mean if we rented, we are paying more than this. It's unheard of. Even if we lived in a trashy place in a trashy neighborhood probably

I just don't think the math works to sell unless we were beyond desperate.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And don’t forget, AI is also going to reduce the need for actual people at desks. I’m very worried, sice I have most of my funds tied up in DC real estate.

It has already happened at my job. I work for a small company that does data pre-processing and we have developed (or purchased..I have no idea) some tools that do some of the tasks. As a result, my team went from 5 people to 3. Just 2 years ago, we were thinking about hiring more people. Instead we are down 2 people.

I cannot speak for fields that I do not work in, but some of us are at risk. My company has been very very quiet about it.

And I will also add some of the tools deal with Symbolic AI. Symbolic AI is not even ready for prime time....

Anonymous wrote:And don’t forget, AI is also going to reduce the need for actual people at desks. I’m very worried, sice I have most of my funds tied up in DC real estate.

It has already happened at my job. I work for a small company that does data pre-processing and we have developed (or purchased..I have no idea) some tools that do some of the tasks. As a result, my team went from 5 people to 3. Just 2 years ago, we were thinking about hiring more people. Instead we are down 2 people.

I cannot speak for fields that I do not work in, but some of us are at risk. My company has been very very quiet about it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of my friends think there will be mass selling off homes in DC metro with huge percent of population becoming unemployed and not enough private industry jobs. For now I see homes still being built, not skipping the beat and there are no bargains, but I am worried about the future of this area despite being in private industry.

We are kind of trapped staying here and cannot sell. Family reasons and also having a cheap rate (like many others) and mortgage we can afford. Moreover, if selling off does happen where would you go? It's expensive everywhere, I can't find anything cheaper that's not a shi*hole. And if prices do tank a lot then this will become a low COL area and you can no longer cash out enough to buy anything in another metro area with a decent job market. I wonder how many people are going to be trapped in the same situation afraid to move for a sticker shock

Opposite. Too much hysteria assuming huge unemployment. If anything, there would be more demand as offices fill more will want to live closer in.

I wish I had access tho whatever it is you’re smoking.

Same! 😆

+1. I assume contributions like the one above are due to someone either not reading the news or refusing to engage with reality, kind of like when Trump was reelected and people didn’t think there would be discernible reverberations in the government.

GSA is terminating leases left and right. I assume commercial RE is at a standstill. Residential is a different market, but it’s going to be impacted. Arlington, Alexandria, Bethesda, Silver Spring, etc.

I am wondering what will happen to all these commercial buildings.. I think this may determine the future economy of DC (at least the city proper) and its RE market. I seriously doubt that they will just sit empty forever and fall into ruin.

They will knock them down and build data centers.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of my friends think there will be mass selling off homes in DC metro with huge percent of population becoming unemployed and not enough private industry jobs. For now I see homes still being built, not skipping the beat and there are no bargains, but I am worried about the future of this area despite being in private industry.

We are kind of trapped staying here and cannot sell. Family reasons and also having a cheap rate (like many others) and mortgage we can afford. Moreover, if selling off does happen where would you go? It's expensive everywhere, I can't find anything cheaper that's not a shi*hole. And if prices do tank a lot then this will become a low COL area and you can no longer cash out enough to buy anything in another metro area with a decent job market. I wonder how many people are going to be trapped in the same situation afraid to move for a sticker shock

Opposite. Too much hysteria assuming huge unemployment. If anything, there would be more demand as offices fill more will want to live closer in.

Offices fill more with who/what? The federal government jobs and leases being reduced?

Anonymous wrote:The largest employer in DC is restructuring to cut the workforce by half. The largest employer is also the largest leaseholder and also announced giving up millions of square feet of commercial space.
Idk if people just have their heads in the sand because they’re used to stability in this sector or if this is some form of hyper normalization to keep things steady - but I can’t fathom how wholesale RIFs and closures doesn’t hurt the DC market.
There is no other industry in this market to take the place of gov. Even GSK / pharma /life sci - which MoCo has hung their hats on - has waned and announced departures.

The issue is that for years people have said DC real estate can never drop and that it’s not like other locations.

Except black swan events do occur. The fires in Pacific Palisades, 9/11 and now, a huge reduction in the federal workforce. No place is immune and diversification is important. Whenever someone tells you that something can never be affected you should question it.

And don’t forget, AI is also going to reduce the need for actual people at desks. I’m very worried, sice I have most of my funds tied up in DC real estate.

The largest employer in DC is restructuring to cut the workforce by half. The largest employer is also the largest leaseholder and also announced giving up millions of square feet of commercial space.
Idk if people just have their heads in the sand because they’re used to stability in this sector or if this is some form of hyper normalization to keep things steady - but I can’t fathom how wholesale RIFs and closures doesn’t hurt the DC market.
There is no other industry in this market to take the place of gov. Even GSK / pharma /life sci - which MoCo has hung their hats on - has waned and announced departures.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of my friends think there will be mass selling off homes in DC metro with huge percent of population becoming unemployed and not enough private industry jobs. For now I see homes still being built, not skipping the beat and there are no bargains, but I am worried about the future of this area despite being in private industry.

We are kind of trapped staying here and cannot sell. Family reasons and also having a cheap rate (like many others) and mortgage we can afford. Moreover, if selling off does happen where would you go? It's expensive everywhere, I can't find anything cheaper that's not a shi*hole. And if prices do tank a lot then this will become a low COL area and you can no longer cash out enough to buy anything in another metro area with a decent job market. I wonder how many people are going to be trapped in the same situation afraid to move for a sticker shock

Opposite. Too much hysteria assuming huge unemployment. If anything, there would be more demand as offices fill more will want to live closer in.

I wish I had access tho whatever it is you’re smoking.

Same! 😆

+1. I assume contributions like the one above are due to someone either not reading the news or refusing to engage with reality, kind of like when Trump was reelected and people didn’t think there would be discernible reverberations in the government.

GSA is terminating leases left and right. I assume commercial RE is at a standstill. Residential is a different market, but it’s going to be impacted. Arlington, Alexandria, Bethesda, Silver Spring, etc.

When would we start seeing signs either way, of a downturn or spike?

When it becomes clear what the next step is after initial elimination of jobs. There are only speculations now as to whether there will be a re-org and re-hiring under a different paradigm or complete elimination of certain government functions. It's also unclear what will happen to DT DC business area with so many empty buildings that aren't going to be filled up and leases will be discontinued. I think this spring we will see more movement, but prices aren't clear. It will be maintly to individual circumstances until more is known.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the goal is privatization. Keep/bring back key employees into a private firm position where there is more latitude to hire/fire and drive productivity and ROI. Smaller org is easier to manage and monitor the money. IDK, it's all speculation at this point. CNN walked out a few hundred recently and it seemed like no one cared. Companies have gone bankrupt and out of business leaving people without jobs and life just went on.

It's not. They're coming down hard on contracting, too.

Re-org does not imply no contractors will be let go. In private industry contractors are the first to go since they are easier to get rid of and don't require HR involvement or severance.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of my friends think there will be mass selling off homes in DC metro with huge percent of population becoming unemployed and not enough private industry jobs. For now I see homes still being built, not skipping the beat and there are no bargains, but I am worried about the future of this area despite being in private industry.

We are kind of trapped staying here and cannot sell. Family reasons and also having a cheap rate (like many others) and mortgage we can afford. Moreover, if selling off does happen where would you go? It's expensive everywhere, I can't find anything cheaper that's not a shi*hole. And if prices do tank a lot then this will become a low COL area and you can no longer cash out enough to buy anything in another metro area with a decent job market. I wonder how many people are going to be trapped in the same situation afraid to move for a sticker shock

Opposite. Too much hysteria assuming huge unemployment. If anything, there would be more demand as offices fill more will want to live closer in.

I wish I had access tho whatever it is you’re smoking.

Same! 😆

+1. I assume contributions like the one above are due to someone either not reading the news or refusing to engage with reality, kind of like when Trump was reelected and people didn’t think there would be discernible reverberations in the government.

GSA is terminating leases left and right. I assume commercial RE is at a standstill. Residential is a different market, but it’s going to be impacted. Arlington, Alexandria, Bethesda, Silver Spring, etc.

When would we start seeing signs either way, of a downturn or spike?

Anonymous wrote:I think the goal is privatization. Keep/bring back key employees into a private firm position where there is more latitude to hire/fire and drive productivity and ROI. Smaller org is easier to manage and monitor the money. IDK, it's all speculation at this point. CNN walked out a few hundred recently and it seemed like no one cared. Companies have gone bankrupt and out of business leaving people without jobs and life just went on.

It's not. They're coming down hard on contracting, too.