Chicago's Home Prices, Taxes Spark an Exodus From Cook County

Bloomberg reports:

Arturo Castro is part of the reason that the population of Cook County, Illinois, with Chicago at its core, is shrinking more than any other U.S. county.

Castro, who couldn't afford home prices where he was renting in Cook County, paid $170,000 for a 100-year-old, five- bedroom house in Waukegan in Lake County, an hour's commute from Chicago. ``I traded convenience for price and room,'' says Castro, 41.

Cook County is losing people from its inner suburbs for the first time as residents leave for bigger houses and more land at lower prices at the edge of the metropolitan area, demographers say. The county had the biggest population drop among U.S. counties last year: a decline of 73,000 from 2000, or 1.4 percent, to 5.3 million, federal Census Bureau estimates show.

The 956-square-mile (2,476-square-kilometer) county, the second most populous in the U.S., was the only county among the nation's 10 largest to lose residents from 2000 to 2005. County commissioners say higher house prices and taxes contributed to the exodus from communities next to Chicago.

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