Kenmore Undressed

Localism: Is It Just Another Pseudo-Trend or Is It For Real?

 

Yesterday, the Seattle Times featured an interesting article entitled:  “The New Localism: saving Main Street” in which the author and futurist, Joel Kotkin,  expresses the idea that the current financial chaos facing the United States may, in fact, be a catalyst in strengthening family ties and local communities. Mr. Kotkin points out that localism isn’t really a new phenomena, in fact, there has been a push for more localized markets and businesses for many years.  The difference today is that we have greater access to technologies that can help communities localize in more creative ways.

Since the early 70’s  books such as Future Shock and A Nation of Strangers and more recently Bill McKibben’s Deep Economy and Robert Putnam’s Bowling Alone have pointed out that America is “falling apart at the seams” due to the huge changes taking place in the world.  Kotkin suggests that we are seeing a reversal of this trend:

1) More Americans are staying closer to home. He writes that Americans born today are more likely to reside near their place of birth than in the 19th century. This is driven by an aging population and more limited economic opportunities.

2) Higher fuel prices are forcing Americans to spend less time traveling. It is also fueling a resurgence of local markets and local manufacturing. Simply put, transporting food and other products has become very expensive. Purchasing these things more locally makes sense.

3) Technology has allowed millions of Americans to work from home either as telecommuters or private businesses.

What fascinates me as a realtor is how “localism” has recently become a common notion in the real estate industry as well. A growing number of real estate agents  are writing blogs that focus on hyper-local markets such as their own town, neighborhood or social group.  This blog is a perfect example of a blog that focuses on my hometown.  I believe a local approach will ultimately provide better service to buyers and sellers. I also believe that agents who blog their own communities are more focused on their area of expertise and can rightly call themselves “neighborhood experts.”

To answer the question, is localism relevant, yes. Is it a pseudo-trend, I don’t think so.

Market picture by natalie maynor