Every municipality in Virginia bases its land use planning on the anticipated demand for new housing. Their plans are only as good as their projections. And the projections are good only as long as historical trends hold up.
The demand for housing is based upon the rate of new household formation. And that is driven by population growth and the average size of the household. Of the two, population growth is the most important, but average household size is by no means insigificant. Look what’s happened over the past century or so: In 1915, the average household size stood at 4.5. By 1967, it had declined to 3.0, and by 2006, it had dipped again to 2.6.
Bottom line: Shrinking household size has turbo-charged the growth in demand for housing. Insofar as housing projections are predicated upon past increases in household formation, the planning assumptions embedded in comprehensive plans across Virginia assume that average household size will continue to shrink.
While population is expected to continue increasing, we cannot assume that household sizes will continue to shrink. Indeed, there is evidence that household sizes actually may begin to increase in size. That is the thesis of a column, “Reinventing the Family,” that I wrote earlier this week for the Times-Dispatch. (Here is the version posted on the Boomer Project web site.)
One factor is the increasing tendency of adult GenYs to live longer with their parents. Whether the trend reflects a prolonged adolescent dependency or the economic realities of student loans and credit card debt, I don’t know. But it’s happening. At the same time, on the older end of the age scale, more parents are moving in with their children. Thus, we’re seeing signs of a re-emergence of a three-generation household. (There are other factors reversing the atomization of the family, but those are the two biggest.)
I suspect this trend will be accelerated by the severity of the current recession. As unemployment shoots up, it only makes sense for family members to combine residences and reduce overhead. As much as Americans love their big homes and personal privacy, they are not immune to economic forces. They will change their behavior in response to adverse economic circumstances.
Yesterday, USA Today published an article quoting the National Association of Home Builders to the effect that the average size of new single-family homes, which has climbed steadily over the decades, has gone into reverse. The NAHB’s analysis showed that the average size of new houses declined from 2,629 square feet in the third quarter of 2008 to 2,438 — the steepest dip since researchers started collecting the data in 1999.
Business-As-Usual is on its last legs. Many assumptions that underpinned Virginia’s governance systems of the past half century are no longer valid. We are entering a new era — and I fear that our planners and elected officials are not prepared for it.