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Anecdotally, I know one family that just bought a plot of land in Westchester County (moving out of Manhattan). And this pandemic has accelerated my wife & my

Anecdotally, I know one family that just bought a plot of land in Westchester County (moving out of Manhattan). And this pandemic has accelerated my wife & my house hunt, though we were already thinking of doing it beforehand. But you're right - these are either land purchases or people thinking of buying a home, not actually doing it. There isn't enough time to have gotten through the surveying/planning/permitting process since coronavirus started, all of which proceed much more slowly since everyone is closed or working remotely. Another possibility is that this is reflecting speculative demand. Developers who already own land and have plans drawn up accelerate the process, because they anticipate people will want to move out to the suburbs, and besides financing is cheap now. Whether this'll pay off depends a lot on how the situation evolves - historically pandemics have hit urban areas first but later migrated to the outskirts and then rural areas, and eventually nobody is safe.

Scoundreller 6y ago
> though we were already thinking of doing it beforehand. I think we’re seeing a lot of this effect, and it’s under appreciated. I’ve been thinking of buying a canoe for a while, and suddenly everyone else that was has been motivated to jump into action. Result: canoes are hard to get. Also add up the free time from other things being closed, vacations cancelled, work slowdowns, as well as the new liquidity of time offered by work-from-home... any outlet for that has huge demand now.
- Kye 6y ago
  I had this problem with getting a close-up filter for my lens. They're a cheap way to get into macro-ish photography, and suddenly everyone with a camera needs a way to keep shooting with fewer places to go. My filter just shipped after two months on backorder.
  - ghaff 6y ago
    And you'll probably have trouble getting just about anything related to videoconferencing like high-end webcams, key lights, popular USB microphones, good office chairs, HDMI converters, etc.

Scoundreller 6y ago

> though we were already thinking of doing it beforehand. I think we’re seeing a lot of this effect, and it’s under appreciated. I’ve been thinking of buying a canoe for a while, and suddenly everyone else that was has been motivated to jump into action. Result: canoes are hard to get. Also add up the free time from other things being closed, vacations cancelled, work slowdowns, as well as the new liquidity of time offered by work-from-home... any outlet for that has huge demand now.

Kye 6y ago
I had this problem with getting a close-up filter for my lens. They're a cheap way to get into macro-ish photography, and suddenly everyone with a camera needs a way to keep shooting with fewer places to go. My filter just shipped after two months on backorder.
- ghaff 6y ago
  And you'll probably have trouble getting just about anything related to videoconferencing like high-end webcams, key lights, popular USB microphones, good office chairs, HDMI converters, etc.