2.2 million vacant homes for sale
Want to buy a home? If you have the money then there are 2.2 million homes available for you. But if you wan to sell your home, then it is perhaps not a good news for you.
In the first quarters of 2008 the vacancy rate was 2.9%, a record in itself. In the last year the vacancy rate was 2.6%. This is according to the Census Bureau. For homes built after April 2000, the vacancy rate is 9.8%, which is three times that of houses built before.
This is bad for the homeowners because it means more reduction in the prices of their homes. According to the analysts the prices will further go down. During the boom, builders saw high demand for the houses and earned a lot by selling them at a premium. Those houses are now available which are vacant now. Due to reckless construction, the number of houses went up and at the same time the foreclosure crisis hit the U.S. real estate market. Now the excess houses are lying vacant waiting for someone to acquire them.
The vacancy rate is highest in South at 3.2% and lowest in the Northeast at 1.9%. At the same time the West has witnessed a 2.8% vacancy rate, which is a high jump from the last years 2.3%.
According to Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, the big hit to the US real estate was done by the collapse of the California housing market.
