Opportunities in the wake of Harvey
Where will the dispossessed migrate to? What will this mean for real estate in the Houston area? Will surrounding markets, Austin, Dallas, NO gain? Opportunities to buy? Looking to start a general discussion.
EDIT: Sorry to anyone I offended; this was a poorly timed and worded question.
The shitty timing of this question and your blase attitudes towards people going through some pretty rough shit aside, I think areas of Houston that avoided the worst of the flooding are much more likely to see growth than Austin or Dallas. Doubt you see any long term changes. Houston is the fourth largest city in the US with a strong economy; there won't be a Katrina-level exodus like you saw in New Orleans.
People are hurting there; try not to be a fucking asshole.
When would be a good time to ask this question? Years down the line when capital is no longer needed? As callous as looking for opportunity in others misfortune is, attempting to make a dollar through investment in the rebuilding is far more beneficial to the people of Houston than feigning concern for people you have never met. The hurricane happened; I cant change that, but I am trying to help in my own way, regardless of how it may benefit me. Anyway, you can spend your time admonishing strangers and conjuring up crocodile tears, but it isnt helping anyone.
"5 minutes after the Challenger blew up, he's on the phone shorting NASA stock!"
Reminds me of the d-bags who shorted the market within minutes the planes flew into WTC. However, that was much worse.
What about forum favorite, Bobby Axelrod?!?! While this is an un-savory aspect of finance, I am not convinced it's unethical.
If I ground lease to McDonald's, am I an obesity profiteer? Or does that not count because it's on such a long time span
Just playing devil's advocate: people CHOOSE to eat at mcdonalds. nobody chooses to have a hurricane wipe out their home.
Last I checked, folks have the choice where to live in the US, which includes areas that are prone to natural disasters and areas that aren't.
I'm not arguing that losing your home or lives of friends and family to a hurricane or any natural disaster for that matter isn't awful. My sympathies go out to the people who got caught up in this.
But if you're trying to draw a moral distinction between profiting off of others' short term misfortunes versus long term misfortunes, you'll have to do better than that.
How do you feel about tobacco stocks? Alcohol? How about insurance? Sure, insurance provides a safety net for people who get hit with unlucky events, but providers are still profiting from the fact that these misfortunes occur - maybe they should price policies to be a wash and just provide it as a social service?
Are you all serious about this ethical bullshit? Kinda dumb to consider that "somebody out there is hurt" unless you have some reputational risks imo. Ethics is by no means objective, fair or rational
I live and work in Houston. I was fortunate in that the streets were able to flood and retain / drain off enough of the precipitation that my home was spared.
I have absolutely no issues with what the OP is asking. I would rather have parties interested in investing in and rebuilding the city than vice-versa. It is going to take a few years for the residential market to fully recover for this historic event, and I'm open to any capital that is interested in deployment in Houston, be it private or public.
I think most of what will be built/rebuilt are the existing home sites using FEMA funding or owner's flood insurance if they have it, which many do not due to how rare it is for some of these areas to flood. Most of the places you can throw up multiple (100's-1000's) homes near Houston are already owned and master planned by some of the larger developers. Most of the infill opportunities are overpriced and only work for luxury housing or multifamily.
The Houston housing game is super saturated, so I think you would need to find a first mover's advantage to be a strong player. We are also going to be facing a materials and labor shortage for the foreseeable future, so there's that battle to fight.
There are going to be people displaced in temporary housing for YEARS, and that is terrible. What I hope we don't see are neighborhoods that become completely abandoned, like in New Orleans after Katrina. Due to the school systems anchoring neighborhoods, I don't think that will happen.
I saw a family being interviewed on the news who's townhouse was flooded 3-4ft. They had some flooding happen at the previous tax day floods, so they build the first floor of this New House out of cinder block. Stupid simple, but stupid smart.