WHAT IMPACT HAD THE COVID-19 ON THE INTERNAL MIGRATION AND ON THE REAL ESTATE PRICES?

The pandemic of COVID-19 has affected the lifestyles of people all around the world, leading to tremendous shifts in various sectors (economic, social, environmental...). These shifts occurred due to the regulations imposed by the governments through the lockdowns implemented all over many countries in the world during the pandemic, to limit people’s mobility and prevent the spread of the virus. In response, most industries (education, construction, financial, food services...) have introduced teleworking as a way to persevere their work during this pandemic. Therefore, the requisites of a home have changed to accommodate for more activities and functions, demanding for bigger houses. Many people now have the flexibility and the opportunity to live far from cities, in less crowded places closer to nature, which became one of the drivers to the urban-rural migration. Hence, new decision-making of individual’s location and new housing demands in the property market have arisen in the countryside, suburban and rural areas which led to the changes in the real estate prices. The aim of this study is to understand the impact that COVID-19 had on this internal migration and on the real estate prices from 2020 until today. By using a descriptive case study methodology, this study analyzes and compares the eleven case studies of Ile-de-France region, Greater London region, New York City region, Hangzhou, Greater Tokyo, Greater Los Angeles, Cracow, New South Wales, Metropolitan Area of Naples, Toronto and Montreal and Tbilisi, to validate the presumed context. These eleven regions show that due to the pandemic that led to the internal migration together with the high demand on properties in the countryside and the policies implemented by the governments, the real estate prices in the metropolitan areas have decreased in opposite to the prices in the rural and suburban areas that have increased in some cases, in others the prices have decreased or increased all over the region. This variation in prices imposes a question on the role of cities in the future and how governments together with architects and urban planners can prevent future pandemic driven fallouts in the real estate market, by shedding the light on the rural areas and countryside that were once marginal.