Two Orange County cities cracked a top 10 list of happiest cities in America, with Huntington Beach at #5 and Irvine at #2. Plano, Texas, is the happiest city in the U.S., according to the WalletHub survey.
The personal finance website ranked 182 cities by “emotional & physical well-being,” “income & employment” and “community & environment.”
Irvine came in 14th for emotional & physical well-being, 11th for income & employment and fifth in community & environment for a total score of 71.86, which is five-tenths higher than the No. 3 city, Madison, Wisconsin. Last year, Irvine was ranked the eighth happiest city, just ahead of Huntington Beach at No. 9.
Huntington Beach this year came in sixth for emotional & physical well-being, 46th for income & employment and 28th in community & environment for a total score of 69.74 and sandwiched between No. 4 Fremont, California, which was last year’s No. 1, and No. 6 Fargo, North Dakota. Surf City takes over the No. 5 spot that Plano occupied last year.
Anaheim includes Disneyland, which as everyone with a marketing degree knows is the Happiest Place on Earth, but the city came in 22nd in the 2019 WalletHub rankings.
Garden Grove is No. 40, Santa Ana is No. 57 and Long Beach is No. 71.
Pulling up last is Detroit, Michigan, at No. 182.
Among individual categories, Irvine is No. 2 and Huntington Beach is No. 4 in “sports participation,” where Seattle is No. 1. And Irvine is also No. 2 in “lowest separation & divorce rate,” which has Plano at No. 4 and, at No. 1, Fremont.
Interested in making the move? Call Micah today 714.343.9294.
An Economic Slowdown and Real Estate
Two weeks ago, the National Association for Business Economics released their February 2019 Economic Policy Survey. The survey revealed that a majority of the panel believe an economic slowdown is in the near future:
Their findings coincide with three previous surveys calling for a slowdown sometime in the next two years:
That raises the question: Will the real estate market be impacted like it was during the last recession? A recession does not equal a housing crisis. According to the dictionary definition, a recession is:
During the last recession, prices fell dramatically because the housing collapse caused the recession. However, if we look at the previous four recessions, we can see that home values weren’t negatively impacted:
Most experts agree with Ralph McLaughlin, CoreLogic’s Deputy Chief Economist, who recently explained:
The housing market is just “normalizing”. Inventory is starting to increase and home prices are finally stabilizing. This is a good thing for both buyers and sellers as we move forward.
If there is an economic slowdown in our near future, there is no need for fear to set in. As renowned financial analyst, Morgan Housel, recently tweeted: