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American Ghost Towns Of The 21st Century
24/7 Wall Street ^ | March 27, 2011 | Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on 04/02/2011 2:11:48 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

There are several counties in America, each with more than 10,000 homes, which have vacancy rates above 55%. The rate is above 60% in several.

Most people who follow unemployment and the housing crisis would expect high vacancy rates in hard-hit states including Nevada, Florida and Arizona. They were among the fastest growing areas from 2000 to 2010. Disaster struck once economic growth ended.

Palm Coast, Florida, Las Vegas, Nevada and Cape Coral, Florida were all among the former high fliers. Many large counties which have 20% or higher occupancy rates are in these same regions. Lee County, Florida, Yuma County, Arizona, Mohave County, Arizona, and Osceola, Florida each had a precipitous drop in home prices and increases in vacancy rates as homebuyers disappeared when the economy went south.

1. Lake County, Michigan

Number of Homes: 14,966 Vacancy Rate: 66% Population: 11,014

Lake County is located in central Michigan, a few hour’s drive from the industrial cities of Flint, Pontiac and Detroit. It is in the heart of the state’s fishing district and has been a vacation destination since the early years of the car industry. Many of those second home owners are now gone. This has helped drive nearly 20% of the residents below the poverty level and the median household income to under $27,000 a year.

2. Vilas County, Wisconsin

Number of homes: 25,116 Vacancy Rate: 62% Population: 21,919

Vilas County is located at the uppermost part of Wisconsin, near the border of the Northern Peninsula of Michigan. The county is plagued by two things. The first is that it has been a tourist area for Wisconsin residents. The second is that a significant part of the county’s economy depends on the logging, forestry and construction industries, each of which struggled during the recession.

3. Summit County, Colorado

Number of homes: 29,842 Vacancy rate: 61% Population: 26,843

Summit County sits northwest of the Pike National Forest and due west of Denver. The area is near to several major ski resorts. The local paper reports on revenue “The decrease isn’t linked to the dramatic dip in assessed property values in Summit County, expected to be near 20 percent lower than in the previous valuation period. Those changes will show up in property tax bills starting in 2011.”

4. Worcester County, Maryland

Number of homes: 55,749 Vacancy rate: 60% Population: 49,274

The Maryland State Department of Assessments and Taxation recently estimated that the county would have a sharp drop in its tax base in fiscal year 2012 and “another, more drastic, revenue decrease” for the fiscal year that follows. The twin engines of county’s economy are tourism and agriculture. Experts believe the tourism business in Maryland’s Eastern Shore could stay crippled for years.

5. Mono County, California

Number of homes: 13,912 Vacancy rate: 59% Population: 12,774

Mono County sits near the Sierra Nevada and Yosemite National Parks. Ironically, Bodie, the official state gold rush ghost town, is in Mono County. Finance Director Brian Muir recently said he expected another property drop in property tax receipts. Like most of the other counties on this list, tourism is a major source of revenue for its economy.

6. Dare County North Carolina

Number of homes: 33,492 Vacancy Rate: 57% Population: 95,828

Dare County includes the northern-most parts of North Carolina’s Outer Banks. The situation in the vacation area is so severe that the “Outer Banks Voice” recently wrote, “If Dare County Manager Bobby Outten was intending to sound an alarm by suggesting that the EMS helicopter and school nurses were expendable in the next budget, he probably succeeded.” His comments are unlikely to be terribly different from those of other executives of counties on the list. Vacant homes and homes which lose double-digit amounts of their value each year irreparably undermine the tax base. And, as services fall, fewer potential homeowners will consider investing in the area.

7. Dukes County, Massachusetts

Number of homes: 17,188 Vacancy Rate: 57% Population: 15,527

Dukes County encompasses the island of Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts. The enemy of the local budget is, as is true for most of the counties on this list, falling property values. Vacationers still flock to the resort island in the summer as do seasonal workers. The county is close to deserted when the weather turns cold.

8. Sawyer County, Wisconsin

Number of homes: 15,975 Vacancy Rate: 56% Population: 17,117

The Sawyer County website has a link, prominently placed on the homepage, which goes to a list of foreclosed homes for sales by the sheriff’s department. There are not many new homebuyers. The number of people who live in the county was flat from 2000 to 2010. The Hayward Community School District, located in Sawyer, will probably close one of its elementary schools. Sawyer is a fishing and biking destination, and has suffered from a drop in travelers from the southern part of the state.

9. Burnett County, Wisconsin

Number of homes: 15,278 Vacancy Rate: 55% Population: 16,196

Burnett County is at the western most part of Wisconsin near Minneapolis. The county’s population fell from 2000 to 2010. County Administrator Candace Fitzgerald recently said that proposed budget cuts “could prove to be devastating and very hard to recover from.” The county’s attractiveness as a tourist destination has faltered. Home values have fallen for three consecutive years. Cuts in the Wisconsin State budget will lower state aid. People are more likely to default and abandon vacation homes than their primary residences. This has probably been an important reason vacancy rates in rural tourist areas in Wisconsin are so high.

10. Aitkin County, Minnesota

Number of homes: 16,029 Vacancy rate: 54% Population: 15,736

Aitkin County offers visitors two seasons for recreation. The first is in the summer when fishing is popular. The second is winter when snowmobilers come north. Aitkin is the last of the counties on the 24/7 Wall St. list demonstrating that rural regions which rely on tourists are especially exposed to economic hardship in a recession. They may take longer to recover than some industrialized cities do.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Government; Politics; Society
KEYWORDS: economy; recession; taxes; unemployment
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To: Tax-chick

Stay at Avon or maybe Rodanthe, Waves and Salvo, take the little ones to swim at Canadian Hole or Haulover on the sound side. Warm, calm water with very tiny “waves,” walkable either way. That’s what I did with my niece and dog.

You’re close enough to the Gulf Stream that the water isn’t as cold as up in Duck and further north, 76 degrees when I was there in August, cool but workable. But, you’re far enough away that the crazy rough surf isn’t quite the issue that it would be further down.

The beach was great, not like other NC beaches, 4wd vehicles allowed on many of them, the big dunes, the roar of the still very impressive surf, the sea spray looking almost like fog at night and the campfires dotting the beach as far as the eye can see up and down, almost as many people on the beach at night as during the day.

I love it out there, just wish it was the four hour drive that Wrightsville is, rather than six. Worth it to me, there’s a real sense of remove in going out there.


21 posted on 04/02/2011 3:39:45 PM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

Listing of potential retirement property. (If one doesn’t mind the cold!)


22 posted on 04/02/2011 3:51:29 PM PDT by Pete from Shawnee Mission (Step right up into the mouth of the biggest fiberglass muskie in the world!)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

Listing of potential retirement property. (If one doesn’t mind the cold!)


23 posted on 04/02/2011 3:51:43 PM PDT by Pete from Shawnee Mission (Step right up into the mouth of the biggest fiberglass muskie in the world!)
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To: maica
For example, Worcester County, Md includes Ocean City, a hugely popular summer resort. So 49000+ people show up in 19000+ households on the census, in a county that has 55000 housing units. Almost all of the “empty” housing units are fully occupied in the summer by people who live elsewhere.

Well put. The inclusion of Worcester County made me scratch my head too. If the article was trying to identify severe "under water" houses in MD, ground zero is probably the relatively new upscale areas in PG County that were nuked by the downturn in house prices. Some of those houses are selling for 60% of what they were fetching as new houses 4 years ago.
24 posted on 04/02/2011 5:35:01 PM PDT by rockvillem
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To: RegulatorCountry

I was very nearly sucked out into the ocean on a raft off Cape Hatteras. I fell asleep and finally heard someone screaming at me from far off.


25 posted on 04/02/2011 5:40:12 PM PDT by combat_boots (The Lion of Judah cometh. Hallelujah. Gloria Patri, Filio et Spiritui Sancto.)
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To: combat_boots

You must be a very sound sleeper, those are some of the stoutest waves I’ve ever encountered on the east coast outside of a Nor’easter.


26 posted on 04/02/2011 5:43:37 PM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: RegulatorCountry

Frankly, I have no idea how I survived my life. It’s a mystery!


27 posted on 04/02/2011 5:48:54 PM PDT by combat_boots (The Lion of Judah cometh. Hallelujah. Gloria Patri, Filio et Spiritui Sancto.)
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To: rockvillem; truthfreedom

Another way to look at these statistics: Americans are so rich ~on average~ that a second home practically became a ‘right’ in the past few decades.

I lived out of the country for decades, and when I moved back, I discovered that all my friends from school and my early years owned a second home somewhere. Keeping up with the Joneses apparently included having that vacation property.


28 posted on 04/03/2011 4:16:17 AM PDT by maica ( It is better to trust in the LORD Than to put confidence in man.)
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To: maica
Keeping up with the Joneses apparently included having that vacation property.

Why do you assume the reason behind their getting a vacation home had anything to do with impressing other people? What kinds of "friends" did you have from high school? Some of my old HS acquaintances, I'll admit, might have a second property soley to impress others, but most -- like my family did when I was a kid -- have vacations homes because they're fun.

Those who think that other have vacation homes "to keep up with the Joneses" insult a whole helluva lot of good people.

29 posted on 04/03/2011 9:48:43 AM PDT by Finny ("Raise hell. Vote smart." -- Ted Nugent)
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To: Finny

Whatever! You sound a little sensitive on the issue.


30 posted on 04/03/2011 1:35:53 PM PDT by maica ( It is better to trust in the LORD Than to put confidence in man.)
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