Rental Market May Reap Benefits from the Housing Slump

Today's multi-housingnews.com news included an item about California affordable housing builder AMCAL focusing efforts on market-value apartments.

The company plans to build two this year. Why? According to Sid Paul, AMCAL Equities' Vice President of For-Sale Housing, mortgage restrictions and dwindling loan options in California--which saw some of the greatest increases in property values before the housing slump and some of the biggest declines during it--are prompting more and more residents to rent.

"We're seeing a void for workforce earners who may not be low wage earners, but who may have a need for rental properties," Paul told multi-housingnews.com.

Although the Wall Street Journal reported this week that U.S. home ownership has declined just a touch in recent years--it was 68.2 percent in the second quarter of 2007, down from a record 69.2 percent in 2004--the rental market, it seems, stands to benefit as the housing decline drags on.

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