Since the 1940s, the US has been adding roughly 9 million new homeowning households about every 10 years. This, after all, is a fundamental component of the American Dream. But Aziz Sunderji -- who writes over at Home Economics -- has recently been arguing that this 80-year boom is now at an inflection point. And it is largely because the rate of population growth in the US is now declining. Here's his chart, which uses data from the US Census Bureau and the World Bank:

In fact, for the first time ever, the Census Bureau is now forecasting the US population to start declining. The current forecast has its population reaching a high of 370 million in 2080 and then declining to 366 million by 2100. But even before these far off dates, organic growth is expected to turn negative in less than 15 years (see above). So yeah, it makes sense that this would impact the real estate sector.

For more on the future of homeownership, check out Aziz's Home Economics.

It is estimated that about 1% of the total housing stock in New York City is rent controlled (2019 figure), which is something different than rent stabilized.

Generally the way the former works is that you have to have been living continuously in the home since July 1, 1971, and the building itself needs to have been constructed before 1947. If this is the case, then in theory, you should have seen relatively minor rent increases over the years.

This was the case for the late real estate agent, Alice Mason, who died at the beginning of this year at the age of 100:

She never left the rent-stabilized [controlled?] apartment where she held her storied dinners, in a century-old building on East 72nd Street. (In Manhattan real estate parlance, it was a classic eight, a gracious prewar layout that included three bedrooms and two maid’s rooms.) In 2011, the developer Harry Macklowe bought the building for a reported $70 million and began to turn the units into condos, buying out the tenants to do so. But Ms. Mason refused to give up her apartment. When she moved there in 1962, the rent was $400 a month. At her death, it was $2,476. The apartment below her, in the same line, was recently on the market for just under $10 million.

Green, Penelope. “Alice Mason, Real Estate Fixer and Hostess to the Elite, Dies at 100.” The New York Times, 13 Jan. 2024, www.nytimes.com/2024/01/11/style/alice-mason-dead.html.

For better or for worse, this is an obviously awesome deal, and reason enough to never move and have family members move in with you before you die so that you can try and pass down this asset for generations to come.

BlogTO recently asked: Is it a good time or a bad time to buy a condo in Toronto right now? My unsolicited opinion is that if you are someone who would like a home in Toronto, now is an excellent time to buy it. But that's not actually what I want to talk about today.

If you read the post, you'll come across this line: "She emphasized that these are unprecedented interest rates..." Hmm. I think it's important to point out that these are not unprecedented rates. Rates today are certainly higher than they have been for about two decades. But they've been even higher before and, if you go back to say the 1980s, rates today still look historically low.

We just got used to ultra low rates and now we need to adjust to them being higher. And we will. The first step is feeling confident that rates won't go even higher in the short term. Because if you think you know where rates are going to hang out, you can then make decisions around that.