According to a newly released study by the Rosen Consulting Group and Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban economics for the National Association of REALTORS®, the homeownership rate is near its lowest level in more than 50 years.
Through the 1990s and early 2000s, the national homeownership rate jumped to 69.2 percent, adding about 11.3 million new owner households nationwide from 1994 through 2004. That trend shifted, however, as the ownership rate plummeted over the past decade due to the foreclosure crisis and Great Recession.
In 2016, the homeownership rate reached an annual average of 63.4 percent, a 5.8 percentage point decline compared to the pre-Recession peak. All regions of the country have been “severely affected” by the declines in the homeownership rates, the report notes. The West and Southern regions have faced the largest declines in ownership rates.
What Prompted the Plunge?
9.4 million homes that were lost to foreclosure, short sales, and deed-in-lieu transactions from 2007 through 2015.
Tight mortgage credit
Change in demographics
Growth in “doubling up” with adult children moving back in with parentsJob losses that affected real median household incomes
The good news is that despite the national homeownership rate declining to historical lows, researchers remain optimistic that rates will stabilize and possibly even improve in the near to medium term.
Information extracted from an article By Melissa Dittmann Tracey, REALTOR® Magazine Daily News