Number of US homeowners reaches 20-year low

[unhappycamper]

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jun/24/us-housing-homeowners-rent-20-year-low



As homeownership rates drop to historic lows, low-income, middle-class and minority Americans feel the pinch of steadily increasing rents

Number of US homeowners reaches 20-year low
Jana Kasperkevic in New York
Wednesday 24 June 2015 14.49 EDT

The American dream is increasingly just that - a dream. Since the 2008 recession, owning a home has been a realistic goal for a shrinking number of people.

In 2014, the national homeownership rate slid for 10th consecutive year to 64.5%, reaching lowest homeownership in 20 years, according to a report released by Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University.

Even as US is on the path to recovery and unemployment has dropped to 5.5%, homeownership rate still continues to fall. In the first quarter of this year, it has dropped to 63.7% – lowest quarterly rate since early 1993.

This drop in homeownership “erases nearly all of the increase from the previous two decades”, according to Chris Herbert, managing director of the center. He added that “the trend does not appear to be abating”.

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dubya sez:

[unblock]

1. shame on the guardian for that math-impaired headline.

the *rate* of home ownership is at a 20-year low.

the *number of homeowners* doesn't appear to be mentioned in the article, but i suspect it's still rather above where it was 20 years ago.

[jtuck004]

2. Nope

Last edited Fri Jun 26, 2015, 07:31 PM - Edit history (1)

http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com/renting-generation-homeownership-rates-by-age-ownership-rates-renters/

I don't think you accounted for the increase in population who are simply not buying - many of the sales were from investment groups, and today is from foreign investors. All told we are nearing a 50 year low in home ownership for Americans.

It is getting worse by the month, because more people are renting, and can't afford that either...


http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/22/opinion/hickey-affordable-housing/index.html

...
A new analysis by Zillow finds that the typical renter can no longer afford the median rent in 90 cities across the United States. Many Americans are severely cost-burdened: 4 million working renter households pay more than half of pre-tax income on rent.
...

I realize it is pointless for those who prefer limits to other people's freedom, but: http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com/renting-in-feudal-america-renting-new-american-dream-incomes-study-data/

Reminds me of something I read once.

The rich will do anything for the poor but get off their backs
— Karl Marx

[unblock]

3. given the population increase in the last 20 years,

there's plenty of room for the rate to go down while the *number of homeowners* still goes up.

the term "number of homeowners" is simply the wrong term, it doesn't relate to the article or your links.

[jtuck004]

4. I'm sure you have a reason for not looking, just like dog poop is now more important than

reading anything else from yours.

ltr

[unblock]

5. wtf did i do to you?

[unblock]

6. here we go, link from the census:

http://www.census.gov/housing/hvs/data/histtabs.html

table 8 shows historical data on housing inventory.

1995q1: 64,060,000 owner-occupied homes
2005q1: 74,488,000 owner-occupied homes
2015q1: 74,018,000 owner-occupied homes

so the number has actually inched down over the last 10 years, but certainly up over the last 20.

[Yo_Mama]

7. HO Rate much worse than that - 1980 Q1: 65.5%; 2015 Q1: 63.8

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/RSAHORUSQ156S

Of course there are other variables when looking at homeownership - when the number of people in their younger twenties increases, that will push homeownership rates down looked at in the aggregate for a time even if HO ownership rates by age remained stable. But they have not remained stable. The rate of younger twenties has dropped:
https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=1lSI

As for total number of owner-occupied housing units, the total has dropped by more than 2.5 million from the peak in 2006:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/EOWNOCCUSQ176N

You may be technically correct, but no one looks at these statistics like this; the total number of owned housing units is irrelevant, whereas the population-adjusted number of owned housing units is relevant.

What is very, very relevant is that the situation continues to worsen year by year, and as you look at the details the damage gets worse.

[unblock]

8. i agree. i'm not saying the the number of homeowners is a useful indicator of anything.

it's just the headline i have a problem with. stupid math error.

don't say number of homeowners when you mean home ownership rate.