What Hartford Gets Wrong About Housing in New Canaan

Why We Stay in New Canaan, and Implications for the Real Estate Market

A friend sold his business and set out to do everything he’d dreamed of. He did them all. Then one April morning, walking off the golf course, he checked his scorecard: 40 rounds—and it wasn’t even May. He said, “I’m going back to work.” Not for money. For meaning. That’s what people miss when they leave. Not just the place. The purpose. The kind you find chairing a building committee. Running a nonprofit. Serving on an allocation panel—fifteen site visits in two weeks.

New Canaan’s move rate is 7.8%. Connecticut’s is 11.1%. That’s no accident. We looked at ten years of home sales. Most of our homes sold once. For single-family homes it’s 1.16 sales per decade. Condos were 2.2—slightly higher turnover, often by downsizers. Looking at the years 2014–2019 it was 1.10. Then, between 2020–2024 it rose to 1.19., a slight post-COVID bump. The longer stays means deeper roots. More people stay to see things through.

Connecticut averages 23.4 volunteer hours per person per year. At $34.79/hour, that’s $813 in civic value. In New Canaan it translates to $16.7 million a year. I think that number is almost certainly low. New Canaan volunteers more, gives more, stays longer. This is what community stability looks like—measurable, local, and built to last.

I’m working with half a dozen downsizers. All staying in town. Or close by. I asked why. “Our friends are here.” That’s what they say. But it’s more than that. They’re on the boards (17), Commissions (11), Advisory groups (8), Committees (10) listed on the town website, or the 83 non-profits that our service clubs support. Altogether, I count about 250 volunteer seats in town government alone. A friend was asked to run again for office. She told me, “My work here isn’t done.” She’s chaired building committees. Managed big projects. People trust her to get things finished. That’s the theme. We stay because we have purpose.

Each year, Rotary, the Exchange Club, and the New Canaan Community Foundation give more than $1 million to nonprofits in our region. That’s not the interesting part. The interesting part is how they give it. They don’t just write checks. They ask for help deciding who gets what. They form allocation committees. Dozens of residents volunteer. They divide up the applicants. They make site visits. They take notes. They report back. I’ve seen the list: KEYS, AmeriCares, Meals on Wheels, Staying Put, LiveGirl, KidsInCrisis…

We reviewed three sets of 2024 grants: Rotary, Exchange, and the New Canaan Community Foundation. The result: 83 nonprofits received funding. Around twenty-five are based in New Canaan. The rest serve Stamford, Norwalk, Bridgeport, and Danbury. Eighteen focus on youth. Twelve on seniors. Eleven on food insecurity. Nine on health or mental health. Others support housing, education, addiction, or the arts.

At least 21 nonprofits were funded by more than one organization. These include: KEYS, AmeriCares, Meals on Wheels, Staying Put, Getabout, Future 5, Filling in the Blanks, Rowan Center, Town Players, and Waveny LifeCare, among others.

Many operate with volunteers. Some out of church basements. These are the groups allocations committees visit. The ones donors choose year after year. The ones board members quietly sustain. This is what people stay for.

People move here for the schools. They stay for the work. Not their job. The real work. Coaching. Fundraising. Visiting a nonprofit. Chairing the next thing. Running for office when no one else will. We’ve talked for years about what draws people in. Test scores. Commute. Curb appeal. But no one tracks what keeps them here. It’s not just friends. It’s being useful. Once you’ve helped get a theater built, or a trail maintained, or a grant distributed, you want to see what happens next. That’s the civic f…

Some towns are too large. Some are too small. A few are just right. Towns like New Canaan, Darien, Wilton, Ridgefield, Westport—populations near 20,000, covering 20–40 square miles—have a kind of civic gravity. They’re big enough to support nonprofits, theaters, museums, and volunteer programs. But small enough that you’ll see people you know at all of them. In larger towns—Greenwich, Stamford, Norwalk, Fairfield—populations hit 60,000 or more. So does sprawl. It takes 20 minutes to get from backcountry…

We talk about sense of place. This is it. Not the Green. Not the real estate. Not the schools. Not anymore. It’s a Tuesday night at Town Hall. It’s the Rotary lunch. It’s your neighbor dropping off a meal for someone else’s parent. And if you’re paying attention, it’s the reason they stayed.

Notes from the Monday Meeting: Marketwatch reports today, “The Housing Market is Finally Buyer-Friendly as More Sellers Slash Prices” Fake news. Not one of the 10 places they list are within 1000 miles of here. The closest is Jacksonville. According to NAR, New Canaan is a seller’s market, with 2.59 months of inventory (down 16%) with a sold to list price ratio of 105.7%, 23 days on market and a median sold price of $2.79 million.

John Engel is a broker on the Engel Team at Douglas Elliman, and he is on a list. This is the time of year when agents promote on social media that they made a Top Agents list based on last year’s production numbers. Maybe the achieved top 1% of agents companywide or are now #13 in Connecticut. Sometimes it’s a little more squishy, like President’s Circle or Rising Star. It’s important to remember that a lot of great agents aren’t on a list. And others cheat. In an age where we rank everything (colleges, hedge funds, school districts…) its important to remember that we are more than a number.

Check out John Engel’s Podcast, Boroughs & Burbs, the National Real Estate Conversation here.

Read this article on the New Canaan Sentinel website here.