Top Priorities

New survey data reveals that the vast majority (87 percent) of US adults believes climate change poses a risk to the world. The findings come as the effects of climate change are becoming ever more visible around the world. The new report from Anytime Estimate — an online real estate education platform owned by Clever Real Estate — surveyed 1,000 US adults and found that only 6 percent don’t believe climate change exists. Eighty percent of respondents who have accepted our collective role in exacerbating climate change indicated that they would be willing to make personal sacrifices to help combat it — such as using less electricity (59 percent) or fewer plastic products (61 percent), reducing the amount of water they use (48 percent), eating less meat (40 percent) and driving less (35 percent).

Getting down to what was likely the real reason for the survey, 93 percent of respondents believe that climate change will impact the already-volatile real estate market. About half expect homes and home insurance to become more expensive due to the impact of natural disasters. In fact, the likelihood of disasters has played a role for 3 in 5 people in deciding where to move. Despite this, the study found that cost of living and housing prices still win out as top priorities during a housing search: The majority (63 percent) of respondents remain open to buying a home in a more at-risk area if the short-term financial costs remain low. Regardless, respondents anticipate climate change will have impacts far beyond real estate — 1 in 3 US adults believes that our attempts at climate action now will be too little, too late — with more than half (57 percent) believing that Earth will become uninhabitable within 500 years.

Source: Sustainable Brands