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Yet more about housing in the United States

As I semi-promised earlier today, here's a chart showing the housing situation in each state:

States like Maine and Vermont have loads of housing, while the entire West Coast is at the very bottom. Oddly, Texas is well below the average. I would have expected them to have loads of housing.

And with that I'm off the housing beat. I've spent too much time on a subject that's not really a hot button of mine. On the bright side, the original chart showing the steady decline in housing over the past decade was kind of interesting, and I also learned a little bit about using the Census Bureau's data tool. So it was probably worth it.

13 thoughts on “Yet more about housing in the United States

  1. rick_jones

    States like Maine and Vermont have loads of housing

    Absent a figure for just how many housing units more than households there should be, at first blush it seems they have too much housing.

    and I also learned a little bit about using the Census Bureau's data tool.

    Thank you for the link.

      1. Rattus Norvegicus

        Montana is the same way. Lots of hobby ranches and vacation homes, but if you want to buy a place where the jobs are so you can live here year around? Fergiddaboutit. It is probably also worth pointing out that things in the nicer rural spots (like where I live) have changed considerably since the pandemic began. Since 2020 home prices here have gone up by 25% or so.

  2. rick_jones

    Oddly, Texas is well below the average.

    Perhaps for a very loose definition of "well below" - Mk I eyeballing the chart you provide suggests the US Average is 114%, and Texas is at roughly 113%.

  3. Jasper_in_Boston

    Not that Kevin is making a claim to the contrary, but this doesn't tell us very much (or really anything) about the issue of housing affordability. I know blue metro residents will argue till they're, well, blue in the face to the contrary (and their opinions tend to get amplified by the media, which is over-concentrated in places where they live), but some of the worst affordability situations in America are found in states like Mississippi, because of low wages.

    This brings to mind the example of a huge city often touted by the YIMBY crowd, Tokyo. By all accounts Japan's strong "shall issue" laws with respect to building permits have meant that rents have risen in the Japanese capital far more slowly than in other big, rich global cities like London and New York. And in absolute terms it's definitely the case that Tokyo is far cheaper than these two (or SF, Boston, LA, Vancouver, etc).

    But wages have been stagnant in Japan* for several decades now, and so Tokyoites aren't quite living in a housing nirvana.

    *(Did you know South Korea has passed Japan in per capita GDP?. It's true!)

    1. rick_jones

      https://www.nippon.com/en/japan-data/h01101/

      Japan’s calorie-based food self-sufficiency rate in 2020 fell by one point from the previous year to 37%, according to a Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries’ report. This was the lowest level on record alongside the years 1993, when cold weather caused a poor rice harvest, and 2018, where unusual weather resulted in a decline in wheat and soybean crops.

  4. Vog46

    About 67% of Americans own their own home
    Yet, our population decline which is ongoing will eventually cause a severe over supply of single family homes
    UNLESS the republicans allow for more immigration.

    Demand declines will affect a LOT of things, some more quickly than others. Housing will go into a slow decline in demand as time goes on.

  5. ctownwoody

    No distinction between residential properties used as residences and residential properties being held vacant as short-term rentals, investment properties, etc. Southern Florida is awash in affordability problems despite a ton of housing. Investors are buying up properties either to flip or hold until the tear-down value reaches a peak, and AirBnB isn't helping.

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