Micron announced its new fab. But where will thousands of employees live in Boise?
Micron Technology Inc.’s announcement Thursday that its Boise campus would be home to a new plant for memory manufacturing. With that comes tens of thousands of new jobs, with at least several thousand coming to Boise.
Which raises the question: Where will they live?
Micron said it would add about 2,000 workers for the plant. While Micron didn’t precisely say that those jobs would all be in Boise, it seems likely that most of those jobs would be at the plant itself. The company said it also expects the plant to generate 15,000 additional jobs at other employers, some of which could be in the Boise area.
The Treasure Valley was seized by a crisis when the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated demand by people moving here out of state. House prices reached never-imagined prices. Only since spring has the market finally softened, with the supply of for-sale houses rising, offering hope that the Boise area may be slowly coming out of the historic housing shortage.
A longtime Boise developer and the leader of the local association of real estate agents say Micron needs to think about how to house its thousands of workers.
“Micron should be prepared to help support new housing developments to whatever extent they’re willing, because it’s gonna take a lot of resources to create adequate housing,” said downtown Boise developer Clay Carley, who builds apartments, many of them affordable, with his company called Old Boise.
Large Idaho employers struggle with housing shortage
Throughout Idaho, big employers like St. Luke’s and some school districts have struggled to find employees, largely because of housing costs and the shortage. Carley, who is working with St. Luke’s in McCall to find a housing solution for its employees, said Micron could purchase properties to house employees or partner with landowners in South Boise who may want to develop housing.
Becky Enrico Crum, president of the Boise Regional Realtors, said she expects Micron will partner with the city of Boise, the Boise/City Ada County Housing Authorities, builders and contractors.
“I already know of some builders that are saying, ‘Look, we’re going to start building houses again, that you can buy for $399,000,” said Crum by phone. “We haven’t seen those kind of price tags (in a while) but they are already starting to recognize that it is a need.”
Carley said the company’s job announcement could spur a needed burst in home building again.
Corey Barton Homes, Idaho’s largest home builder, told Bloomberg in August that the company had cut its home building in half as unsold inventory began to pile up. The Micron news could restore the hope that demand will come back.
“If they owned land anywhere near Micron, and they knew this was going to happen, they would immediately start planning to build for that demand,” Carley said.
After the new fab is built, Boise won’t need housing for just Micron employees. Carley predicted that Micron’s addition would put Boise back on the map for other high-tech businesses.
“My hunch is there will be a lot more growth from that Micron plant than just Micron employees, because that typically is what happens,” Carley said.
This story was originally published September 1, 2022 at 3:09 PM.
