‘Parameters of paranoia are changing’ as doomsday-bunker-builders boom in post-COVID normal
As we've detailed on more than one occasion, and not limited to a certain part of the country, people are fleeing major cities for rural communities due to virus pandemic and social unrest.
Feeling insecure, even after the great migration out of cities to rural areas, some Americans are now exploring their options with an added layer of security if the socioeconomic collapse worsens, which is the installation of a doomsday bunker.
Frank Woodworth, the owner of Northeast Bunkers, specializing in design and construction of underground bunkers and based in Maine, said his business model has evolved, and he's not concentrating on luxury bunkers for the top 1%, but rather building affordable bunkers that cost around $25,000.
Woodworth told The New York Times that demand for bunkers has increased since the pandemic and riots.
"Buyers of these kinds of underground dwellings say that they simply want to protect their families from an increasingly turbulent world. For many, the decision to build a bunker was made before the coronavirus pandemic surfaced, but they say that they now feel prepared for the next local or global crisis," The Times said.
Jonathan Rawles, the owner of Survival Realty Brokerage Services, a company with agents and brokers specializing in doomsday bunkers, said:
"There is continual demand for people that are looking to find more of a sustainable future for themselves, for their families," Rawles said. "A lot of real estate markets only focus on housing in the urban areas, suburban areas, exurbs, and there is very much a missed opportunity for people who are looking to live off-grid, wanting to live remote, or actually looking to secure a property, whether that's a bunker or a more secure and sustainable home."
Rawles' firm connects clients with bunker-building companies in the US. "This market and desire for security cuts across all levels of society — social, political, racial, religious," he said. "People are looking for the opportunity to secure the family's future, to have a more sustainable future, and part of that may be having a bunker."
Woodworth at Northeast Bunkers said inquiries about affordable bunkers isn't just limited to the US, people from around the world have requested more information because of the unfolding economic turmoil.
"I'm just a businessman who deals with paranoid people," he said, "and it seems like the parameters of paranoia are changing every day."
Ron Hubbard, president and owner of Atlas Survival Shelters, a fallout shelter company based in Texas, said his underground shelters "meet FEMA standards for providing near-absolute protection."
Hubbard's YouTube account provides access into one of his latest luxury bomb shelter builds - which starts around $94,000 - again these are affordable shelters because demand is with ordinary people, as we've noted over the years, the rich have already built their underground luxury bunkers.
With the affordable bunker business booming - these installers are being kept busy as Americans flee big cities for rural communities and now seek shelters as they fear the socioeconomic collapse will worsen.