Will limiting corporate home ownership reduce the price of single family homes? Both Trump and Newsom propose this as a partial solution to affordability.
Probably not. The California Research Board recently created a new tool that enables anyone to search for home ownership fractions owned by large owners. The tool shows home ownership in Silicon Valley counties by large owners as:
- San Mateo 1.8%
- Santa Clara 2.8%
- Alameda 3.5%
- Contra Costa 3.1%
- Santa Cruz 3.7%
Homes further from the center of Silicon Valley have a higher percentage of homes owned by large owners. It appears that this tool considers owning 10+ units is a large owner. Both Trump and Newsom seem to be focused on larger owners and thus even less ownership.
The California Research Board looked at reports about home ownership and calls out that the Urban Institute found that institutional investors respond to, rather than cause, rent price increases, and that a 2020 study found that institutional investors limited the collapse of prices during the Great Recession providing steadier prices.
More interesting details about institutional home ownership are at https://julianalee.com/blog/corporate-ownership-of-single-family-homes/