There Were Half As Many Affordable Homes For Sale In 2022 As There Were In 2021
There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics - Twain<p>Key observations:<p>* All else being equal, we would expect 50% of homes to be unaffordable to a median buyer. This is the reasonable base figure (not zero). We would expect 2 in 5 if everyone were buying homes they could properly afford.<p>* But they're comparing median <i>county</i> incomes to homes in a <i>metro area</i>. For example they call out Boise, ID but use income from Ada county (already 20% lower!). This issue alone could account for the difference.<p>* There is also an issue of counting homes for sale, vs homes in general. If more expensive homes are sold more often (or, are listed for sale longer - say years - because they're unique) then we will see a skew towards more expensive homes being listed more frequently. It won't accurately represent the actual underlying home inventory.<p>I recommend not reading too much into these numbers.