Transferring in? Research exhibits proof of inhabitants development within the Berkshires | Native Information

PITTSFIELD – Berkshire County has been declining in population since 1970, but new data compiled by the U.S. Postal Service suggests the trend is slowing, and may even be in the early stages of reversal.

Population shifts due to the coronavirus pandemic left the Pittsfield subway area, which spans all of Berkshire County, with the sixth highest change in net immigration among the 926 similar areas in the country between 2019 and 2020 after 30 million changes. Address inquiries compiled by the US Postal Service. The postal service defines the net change as the difference between the number of incoming address change requests and the number of outgoing requests in a subway area compared to all residential addresses.

“It makes intuitive sense that the Berkshires are a place people go when people move from densely populated urban areas. I mean, why not?” said Tom Matuszko, executive director of the Berkshire Regional Planning Commission. “A lot of New Yorkers have been coming to the Berkshires for years. They know the area and are comfortable coming here.”

The data was recently analyzed by the New York Times, which reported that there has been an unusually large exodus of people from large urban areas such as New York and San Francisco, two regions with high percentage of jobs that continue to end after the pandemic . The beneficiaries have been smaller regional metropolitan areas like the Berkshires and areas that are vacation centers.

In the Berkshires, the percentage of people who moved to the county rose from minus 1.4 percent in 2019 to plus 2.5 percent last year, an increase of 3.9 points according to the postal service. Six of the seven metro areas with the highest levels of migration are in the northeast, and the three largest are very close to Berkshire County. The Hudson and Kingston, NY subway areas come first and second, followed by Torrington, Conn. On the third place. Barnstable Town (Cape Cod) ranks fourth and Lebanon, NH, seventh.

While the data is fascinating, it provides a snapshot rather than a complete picture of the problem. According to The Times, not everyone files a change of address form when moving. Young adults leaving college for the first time are largely absent from the statistics, as are households moving to the US from overseas.

Although the census is expected to release data later in the spring that should tell a fuller story of population shifts in the U.S. due to the pandemic, Matuszko said the planning commission also has very little data to support the postal service’s findings.

“We don’t have any quantifiable numbers,” said Matuszko, who checked the numbers. “Whatever this study was about, the postal service data was a source. So far we have not been able to find anything else.”

However, sales of single-family homes in the Berkshires have been incredibly buoyant in the year since the pandemic began, an indicator of people moving to the Berkshires. According to the National Association of Realtors, the median sales price for single-family homes in the Berkshires rose 32.2 percent year over year in the fourth quarter of 2020. This was the second largest increase among the country’s metropolitan areas during this time span.

The county’s total real estate market grew 21 percent last year, according to the Berkshire County Board of Realtors, which only tracks broker-backed transactions. The dollar volume for single family homes rose 60 percent year over year to $ 655 million in 2020. Total sales were 2,344, the highest number since these numbers were first recorded 26 years ago. And the good times are still rolling. Single-family home sales in the Berkshires were up 26.8 percent in March year over year. This is the second highest increase among the state’s 14 counties, according to the Warren Group of Peabody, which tracks all state real estate transactions.

“The only other statistic I know of is real estate sales data,” said Matuszko. “That seems like a strong indicator. If demand is a strong indicator that people are coming in. I’ve heard that in many cases people are paying above asking price and this is indicative of demand. It would make sense that this is Information corresponds to it [Postal Service] study here. “

Although the Berkshires have been losing population for 50 years, it wasn’t seen as a critical economic development problem until 2006. Four years ago, 1Berkshire published a report on the county’s population loss that included 18 recommendations on how to attract more people to the area, particularly in the 22-40 age group where the loss was most acute.

“It’s good to have more people, but when it gets overwhelming it could be a challenge,” said Matuszko. “It’s like everything else. I’ll go back to my job, this could be a good thing with proper planning.”