Given all the urban unrest and pandemic in past couple years, this reads like a reactionary or PR piece to discourage even more people from moving out of cities.
Cities are completely unaffordable right now. If you raised concerns about a sudden glut of empty and available homes, you'd be laughed out of the room.
Not if that room was full of REIT managers. They sometimes hold empty units to boost the prices of the others. Essentially constricting the supply side for larger margins.
It seems prices have risen just about everywhere. Even rural raw land has gone up substantially in the past couple years (what I'm interesed). It should be no surprise with inflation, the increase in the money supply, and some increase in wages, that real assets are "expensive".
I was curious so I clicked through to the Census definitions:
> Vacant Housing Units. A housing unit is vacant if no one is living in it at the time of the interview, unless its occupants are only temporarily absent. In addition, a vacant unit may be one which is entirely occupied by persons who have a usual residence elsewhere. New units not yet occupied are classified as vacant housing units if construction has reached a point where all exterior windows and doors are installed and final usable floors are in place. Vacant units are excluded if they are exposed to the elements, that is, if the roof, walls, windows, or doors no longer protect the interior from the elements, or if there is positive evidence (such as a sign on the house or block) that the unit is to be demolished or is condemned. Also excluded are quarters being used entirely for nonresidential purposes, such as a store or an office, or quarters used for the storage of business supplies or inventory, machinery, or agricultural products. Vacant sleeping rooms in lodging houses, transient accommodations, barracks, and other quarters not defined as housing units are not included in the statistics in this report. (See section on "Housing Unit.")
Unless they’re actually demolishing the houses (and they’re not) then it counts regardless of whether it’s currently on the market or not.
EDIT: Though sure, those might not be reflected in the rental or homeowner vacancy rates. So I looked this up and it has indeed not dropped lately... it also hasn't particularly gone up lately either though: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/EOFFMARUSQ176N
