YourHomeUtah.com

Reprint from Salt Lake Board of REALTORS®

WASATCH FRONT POPULATION SURGE TO OFFER TREMENDOUS ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES, ACCORDING TO THE SALT LAKE BOARD OF REALTORS®

13 November 2008 (Sandy) - Today's troubled economy will pass, largely due to a population explosion set to hit the United States and the Wasatch Front, according to Arthur C. Nelson, presidential professor of city and metropolitan planning at the University of Utah.

Nelson should know. He came to Utah after a 21-year career at Georgia Tech and Virginia Tech and is one the nation's most recognized urban planners. He has been cited as an expert source by Atlantic Magazine, The New York Times, National Geographic, Newsweek, ABC and CBS.

"We are facing tremendous demographic changes in this country and in the Wasatch Front," Nelson said. "The United States is a growing nation. We'll actually add 100 million more Americans to this country faster than any other country with the exception of Pakistan and India."

And here along the Wasatch Front Nelson projects more than 2 million more people will populate the area by 2040, raising the total population count to more than 4.2 million people.

The doubling of the Wasatch Front's population means more homes and more commercial space will be needed to satisfy what Nelson calls a "megapolitan" surge. In fact, Nelson projects more than 900,000 new housing units at a value of $300 billion will need to be built along the Wasatch Front by 2040, a 126 percent increase compared to the roughly 650,000 housing units at present.

The onslaught of more people coming to the Wasatch Front will also coincide with a surge in job growth, according to Nelson, who estimates that more than 1.3 million new jobs will be created in the area by 2040, pushing demand to build roughly 800 million square feet of new nonresidential space that will include offices, retail stores and industrial warehouses. In addition, Nelson said, 1 billion square feet of existing nonresidential space will need to be rebuilt.

The combination of new residential and non-residential space to be built presents tremendous economic opportunities for architects, builders, planners and REALTORS®. "Population and job growth are the key drivers to a strong housing market," said Jillinda Bowers, president of the Salt Lake Board of REALTORS®. "Utah's housing slowdown, while at the present time may seem severe, will in coming years appear as a small blip to the future growth and sales that will again come to this area."

Indeed, the coming population hit will change the very aspects of how and where Utahns live – with more people demanding downtown living and fewer households having children, according to Nelson.

Currently, 37 percent of all Wasatch Front households have children. However, by 2040 that percentage will drop to 29 percent.

"One of the reasons we have childless households growing at a fairly rapid pace is because we are aging," Nelson said. "Many of us have already raised our children and we will be living a long time. The number of people turning 65 years old won't peak until the year 2022."

And, Nelson points out, because people are living longer, only 25 percent of our adult life is now spent raising children.

With rising numbers of Wasatch Front households having no children, demand for downtown living and what Nelson calls "near-center" living will increase. Nelson predicts that 60 percent of all future housing units must be tailored to meet the demand of those wanting downtown or near-center living.

About 10,000 people or roughly 0.5 percent of the Wasatch Front's population currently live in downtown Salt Lake City. Conservatively speaking, that number will grow to 40,000 people by 2040 or 1 percent of the Wasatch Front's population.

"I actually suspect that downtown Salt Lake City could attract up to 100,000 people by 2040, making it one of North America's downtown/near downtown residential gems," Nelson said. "Think Vancouver, British Columbia; San Diego, what Denver is becoming, Portland and Seattle."