Leopards Ate My Face

OP's neighbor is one of the minority of federal workers who are probationary employees, because that's the only group Elon has been able to really fire right now

This part isn't true. At this point, probably over half of the fired workers were permanent, from agencies that are closing or are implementing RIFs. Most are still drawing paychecks, but budgeting does (and should) change once someone is informed that they'll be out of a job in the next month or two.

For many agencies, these satellite offices often have monopsony power over workers of certain job skills. NOAA and the National Weather Service employ a lot of people who have job functions not really available from another employer, especially without moving. The same is true of NIH and CDC. HHS just announced the closure of several lawyer offices, and those specialists are going to have a bit of a rough time finding replacement jobs. USDA is a big organization, and have a ton of economists and scientists who would basically have to take a big pay cut if they're laid off in this environment.

You're downplaying just how devastating some of these job losses are, by ignoring that many of these people moved to these cities in reliance on the job stability they expected, and downplaying the number of people affected and the length of tenure these people have.

I don't have a strong view of whether this story is literally true of this specific account's neighbor. But I can tell you that versions of this story have happened to thousands already, and will happen to tens of thousands more.