Tim Thomas responds to a commenter who says (in response to my observation that families with children are leaving 78704) that young families with kids can't afford to live in town:
Sure, plenty of families can afford to live in town. I'm sure Chris will find them east of IH-35. There are plenty of families living in town in apartments. Just not as many in the single family homes. I'm betting 78741 looks almost the complete opposite. Students have been moving away and being replaced by families.
Naturally, I had to look up the numbers for 78741.
78741 is the zip code to the southeast of downtown. It includes East Riverside, Montopolis, Parker Lane and Pleasant Valley.
Tim is correct. Children moved out of 78704; they poured into 78741. 78704 lost nearly 18% of its kids between 2000 and 2010. 78741 added almost 36%. In 2000, 78704 had more children (7,730 to 7,449). In 2010, 78741 had around 60% more children.
The numbers are also consistent with Tim's impression that students are moving out and children with families moving in. The number of children per occupied housing unit rose from .44 in 2000 to .57 in 2010. (78704 fell from .38 to .3.)
Note that 78741 saw robust 11% growth despite the destruction of several large apartment buildings on East Riverside that have not yet been replaced by new housing and a low 86% occupancy rate. (As with 78704, this partly reflects new housing inventory that has not yet been absorbed by the market.)
One explanation for the surge in children is that housing is much cheaper in 78741 than 78704. Young families with children who want to live close to the middle of town can actually find a place in 78741 to buy or rent. They likely can't in 78704.
That can't be the whole story, though. The rise in children per occupied unit suggests that families with children are displacing households without children. The question is why families with children were outbidding other households (like students) in 2010 but not in 2000.
This will require a look at block-level data, but I suspect the data will confirm that families with children have been displacing students, who are abandoning former student ghettos on Montopolis and far East Riverside to live closer to campus . . . which just so happens to have a lot more room, thanks to all the new housing around the University of Texas.
Housing markets are complicated things.
