Home prices reached record levels amidst other indicators that Americans struggled in 2023
US home sales declined to the lowest level in almost three decades last year as prices rose to a record high.
Sales for 2023 came in at 4.09 million homes for the year, the lowest level since 1995. Additionally, sales in December declined by a full 6.2% versus December 2022.
On a month-to-month basis, sales declined in December in the South, Northeast, and Midwestern United States. Year-to-year sales experienced a decline in all regions of the country including the West.
Median home prices for 2023 rose to $389,800, a new record, demonstrating the effect of investors in the market. Such buyers represented 16% of home sales in December as institutions like Blackrock drove up housing prices in the country. Historically, first-time homebuyers make up 40% of the housing market but this number declined to just 29% in December.
On another measure of economic security, Gallup found a record high number of Americans responding that they were “suffering” in their annual Health and Well-Being survey. The polling organization found a greater percentage of Americans describing their status as “suffering” than during 2008’s Great Recession, continuing a trend from 2022.
Such respondents are “more likely to report lacking food and shelter, more likely to have physical pain, stress, worry, sadness, and anger” according to the firm.
Meanwhile China has made efforts to stabilize housing prices with President Xi Jinping remarking that “houses are built to be inhabited, not for speculation,” but the maxim is unlikely to gain support from either major US political party given the power of the banking sector in the strongly capitalist country.
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