Home Inventory Won’t Return Until at Least 2024: Zillow

Source: National Mortgage News (subscription may be required) 

It will take several years before the supply of homes for sale returns to pre-pandemic levels, but the market will likely get there by the end of 2024, according to the majority of experts surveyed by Zillow.

Meanwhile, the share of purchases from first-time home buyers, which diminished in ongoing market conditions marked by record price growth, will also climb back to its pre-pandemic share of transactions, but exactly when varied by a substantial number of years, panelists said.

In the Zillow Home Price Expectations Survey, 79% of respondents predicted that monthly inventory levels should return to an average of 1.5 million houses for sale by the end of 2024. A substantial portion, 41% of the 109 people surveyed, were even more optimistic and think monthly supply will reach that level by the end of 2023. The total inventory of available homes has fallen from a monthly average of 1.6 million units in 2018 and 2019 to just over 1 million last year, according to Zillow, with monthly data in 2022 thus far showing numbers coming in even lower.