Economists' Forecast Through 2021

Economists' expectations for the real estate market in 2019 and 2020 are "flat to up," and predict that in 2021, the market will have slower growth and returns.

Despite trade and stock market volatility, economists anticipate that real estate transaction volume will remain high through 2021, with $535 billion in 2019 and $500 billion and 2020 surpassing previous estimates. Also, the “Urban Land Institute's Real Estate Economic Forecast,” finds that single-family housing construction's outlook weakened over the past six months, and that expected construction is below the long-running annual average of 974,000 homes.

Real estate economists continue to have a positive outlook for the U.S. economy, capital markets, and real estate fundamentals through 2021. Since the previous forecast six months ago, the United States and the world have been buffeted by trade disputes and increased tariffs, stock market volatility, and reduced global growth prospects. But these events have had little or no impact on medium-term economic and real estate market expectations. Although key real estate metrics such as rent growth and returns are expected to moderate, the surveyed economists predict no major disruption to the current real estate expansion.

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