| Southern California News Group ColumnistJohn Burns’ real estate research shop has become one of the housing industry’s top analytical firms by taking a more holistic view of what drives homebuying.
John Burns of John Burns Research and Consulting says most housing analysts are using outdated formulas to calculate the housing shortage. His firm’s research suggests the nation is only 1.7 million homes short of what’s needed. It’s really kind of at the heart of the people I’m hiring – doing great research and consulting as opposed to, you know, real estate people. And we just decided this new name says better who we are. And also we’ve grown. We have a lot of building products clients now.
I did some work in Korea in the mid-1990s. They were building cities outside of Seoul. Cities went from zero to 500,000 people in less than a decade because they built the infrastructure to get out there and they built the homes. People had a job or they were able to commute back into Seoul. The bond market is signaling that mortgage rates should be in the low 5%. Wage growth continues to be north of 4%. So we’re thinking that’s going to continue. And then we think home prices are going to keep falling.