Tasked through the decades with simply trying to sell a house, realtors in 2023 say they are now most challenged with trying to find enough homes to put up for sale.
According to a new survey just released by the National Association of Realtors, some 32% of respondents said a lack of inventory is hampering their work.
In fact, said Jessica Lautz, deputy chief economist with the group, “housing inventory and affordability continue to be the top obstacles that hold back potential clients in the housing market.”
The lack of inventory, according to various sources, has various causes: “Rising material costs, supply chain issues, and labor shortages stemming from Covid have all negatively impacted housing inventory,” notes the site Bankrate.
According to a housing shortage tracker regularly compiled by NAR, no region of the country is immune to the challenge, with high housing shortages particularly seen on the East and West coasts, but with similar market trends also appearing in parts of the Midwest, southern Florida, and central Texas.
Altogether, it is thought that the current national housing market lacks at least 6.5 million homes to satisfy current demand.
In the last decade, according to one analysis, around 8.5 million single family homes and 3.4 million multi family homes were completed. But at the same time, 15.6 million households, meaning a family unit, were formed.
At the same time, the lack of available homes is driving up prices, notes the site Axios: “The median price, at $419,103, is now 40% higher than it was in January 2020.”
Comparing where things stood in the spring of 2022 with April and May of this year shows a dramatic 25% decline in new listings. And when “demand outstrips inventory,” notes the publication Money, “it translates to a lack of available homes and a spike in competition and prices for the paltry few homes that are on the market.”
Developers have said that an easy cure to what ails the home market is a loosening of credit making it easier to finance new construction and less onerous local zoning policies when it comes to the construction of affordable housing.
In a posting published last month, Nadia Evangelou, NAR senior economist, remarked: “It’s not just about increasing supply. We must boost the number of homes at the price range that most people can afford to buy.”
By Garry Boulard
