1Q22 Witten Advisory Excerpt:
For the last 10 years, we’ve been reporting that the U.S. faced a housing shortage and, as our familiar slide above shows, the shortfall in housing available has never been greater. The nation ended 2021 with more than 2m fewer empty housing units than normal. You’ll notice that the short supply of multifamily rentals in light blue expanded dramatically in the second half of last year, far more than shortages of other housing types grew. Looking forward, this year offers no relief. However, as demand moderates and new completions increase in ’23 and ’24, we should see America’s housing shortage lessen, in turn taking away some of the tailwind behind rent growth and home price appreciation.