Mom-and-Pop Investors Are Quietly Shaping the Housing Market
Often associated with deep-pocketed institutional buyers, data from Q3 2024 paints a different picture for investor activity in the United States housing market.
Institutional investors, though tending to dominate and top news feeds and headlines, only account for a small fraction of total investor activity. It has been reported that most real estate investors are mom-and-pop landlords, who own three to 10 properties.
“While investors have been active in 2024, data on investor activity for Q3 shows only a 2% uptick from mid-year,” wrote Professional Economist for CoreLogic Thomas Malone. “And this slow growth trend is expected to hold.”
According to CoreLogic, All signs point to investor share remaining around 25% of total sales for the foreseeable future as mortgage rates and home prices remain high.
Smaller-scale investors play a powerful but understated role in the market, buoying home prices even as overall demand has softened. Yet, historical trends from mid-2022 to early 2024 show no consistent correlation between investor share and price movements, cautioning against oversimplified narratives about their market impact.
