NAHB: Expectations for Housing Availability Improve

More than one-in-four prospective buyers (28%) in the third quarter of 2020 expect their search for a home to become easier in the months ahead, while 61% percent expect it will be harder or stay the same, according to the latest Housing Trends Report. Strong new and existing home sales in the summer of 2020 may have been a factor contributing to buyers’ improved expectations for housing availability.

By contrast, a year earlier, fewer buyers (21%) expected availability improvements and more (68%) thought it would be difficult to search for a home.

Across generations, expectations that housing availability will improve rose most significantly among Gen X buyers (21% in the third quarter of 2019 vs. 32% in the third quarter of 2020) and Millennials (22% to 30%). Geographically, expectations that housing availability will ease up increased most significantly in the West (16% to 28%) and the Northeast (24% to 35%).

Rose Quint, NAHB’s assistant vice president for survey research, provides more analysis in this Eye on Housing blog post.

The Housing Trends Report is a research product created by the NAHB Economics team with the goal of measuring prospective home buyers’ perceptions about the availability and affordability of homes for-sale in their markets. The HTR is produced quarterly to track changes in buyers’ perceptions over time.

Source: National Association of Home Builders