Lew Sichelman
House hunters are soon likely to see less competition in the market due to a sharp drop in immigration that began last year.
Immigrants typically form households and look for new places to live a year or two after their arrival, according to an analysis by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, suggesting that the impact of the current immigration downturn will be more pronounced in the coming years than it already is.
According to the Census Bureau, net international immigration peaked in 2024 at 2.7 million individuals, then dropped 54 percent in 2025 to 1.3 million. Now, it is projected to plummet 75 percent more by the end of this year to just 300,000.
Rates to Stay Over 6 Percent
A year ago, mortgage giant Fannie Mae was predicting that loan rates would average 6 percent over 2026 and 2027. What a difference a year makes.
Now, Fannie Mae – which keeps money flowing for home loans by buying mortgages and packaging them into securities for sale to investors worldwide – says rates will run in the 6.3 percent to 6.4 percent range until at least the end of 2027.
The last time loan rates were below 6 percent was Feb. 26, shortly before the start of the Iran war, when the weekly average dipped briefly to 5.98 percent.
And when it comes to mortgage rates, every percentage point counts. According to HSH.com’s mortgage calculator, the difference between 5.98 percent and 6.3 percent on a $300,000, 30-year mortgage is $62.12 per month – $1,794.80 vs. $1,856.92.
Housing costs are no longer American consumers’ main concern, says a new survey from marketing company Adtaxi. Per one writeup: “Grocery prices are now the leading financial concern for consumers (23.6 percent), followed by gas and transportation costs (15 percent) and housing affordability (12 percent).”
Price Cuts and New Developments
Sellers are caving in many parts of America. According to a new count by market analytics company Parcl, 38 percent of nearly 1.6 million sellers nationwide have cut prices to move their properties.
Reporting by Banker & Tradesman last month found that the Greater Boston area is largely exempt from the trend.
Homebuilders may finally be acknowledging the advanced ages of many of their customers. Older people don’t like steps, and the share of single-story new homes rose slightly last year, from 47.5 percent to 48.6 percent, the Census Bureau reports.
Homeownership among Millennials jumped 74 percent in the last five years, from 7.13 million households to 12.4 million, RentCafe reports. But 12.6 million Millennial households are still renting.
Landlords Sell Off Single-Family Homes
Even before legislation banning institutional investors from purchasing more single-family homes became law, the eight largest Wall Street landlords were trimming their portfolios.
According to a tally by Parcl, the eight institutions were net sellers of 3,011 houses in the second quarter of this year. That’s nearly six times the number from last year’s second quarter. (However, those eight companies still collectively own nearly 400,000 properties.)
To be sure, the new law has had a chilling impact, especially on big players. But another reason that large-scale investors are buying fewer individual houses is that those deals make less financial sense than they used to.
“After accounting for purchase price, rent projections, renovations and capital costs, it’s harder for institutional investors to find the yields they’d like to justify investment,” writes Lance Lambert of ResiClub Analytics in a FastCompany story. “That’s the driving force behind why institutional homebuying remains subdued since mid-2022.”
Nationwide, roughly 1 in 10 houses sits empty – about 14.5 million of them. “But vacancy doesn’t always mean availability,” writes LendingTree’s Alaya Linton.
Of those 14.5 million vacant houses, LendingTree reports that 4.7 million are used seasonally, 2.6 million are available to rent, and fewer than 800,000 are listed for sale. The remaining unoccupied houses fall into other categories, such as properties that have been sold or rented but are not yet occupied, homes that are reserved for workers or units being held off the market.
Disaster Loan for No Snow
Federal assistance may be available to ski country landlords who struggled to fill their places this winter because of the lack of snow.
Unlike floods, hurricanes and other weather-related events, low snowfall and warm winters are not explicitly recognized as “disasters” under federal laws.
But you may qualify for an Economic Injury Disaster Loan from the Small Business Administration if you are located in an area under a drought declaration.
Under this program, SBA provides loans to affected small businesses that can help them pay their bills until normal operations resume.
Lew Sichelman has been covering real estate for more than 50 years. He is a regular contributor to numerous shelter magazines and housing and housing-finance industry publications. Readers can contact him at lsichelman@aol.com.
