US homelessness reaches highest point since at least 2007

Homelessness in the US grew by 18% year on year as of January 2024, reaching its highest point since the federal government began counting in 2007.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development said in a report released Friday that the spike in people without housing could be traced to rising inflation, natural disasters, an influx of immigration, and the end of Covid-era government programs like the Child Tax Credit.

A lack of affordable housing is linked to the fact that there are simply fewer homes for sale and apartments available to rent. That’s partly because of rising mortgage rates, which makes it less appealing for current homeowners to sell and harder for new buyers to enter the market.

The 30-year fixed mortgage rate has been sitting above 6% since 2022, a level it hadn’t reached since 2008. Mortgage rates tend to track the 10-year US Treasury yield, which recently hit a seven-month high as traders ratchet down expectations for how much more easing the Federal Reserve will deliver following a string of hotter-than-expected CPI inflation reports and the potential that President-elect Trump’s fiscal and trade policies could add to price pressures.

With fewer people being in a position to buy homes, real-estate stocks have taken a hit. The Vanguard Real Estate ETF is down 3.5% over the past five years. Construction firms like DR Horton and Lennar are each down more than 6% this year.