Foreign Buyers Backing Away from US Residential Investment: NAR
Originally published on August 1, 2023, by Troy Green for the National Association of Realtors.
oreign buyers purchased $53.3 billion worth of U.S. existing homes from April 2022 through March 2023, slipping 9.6% from the previous 12-month period, according to a new report from the National Association of Realtors®. Foreign buyers purchased 84,600 properties, down 14.2% from the prior year and the fewest number of homes bought since 2009, when NAR began tracking this data. Overall, U.S. existing-home sales totaled 5.03 million in 2022, down 17.8% from 2021.
"Sharply lower housing inventory in the U.S. and higher borrowing costs across the world have dented international buyers for two straight years," said NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun. "However, recovering international travel following the end of the pandemic will bring more foreign transactions in coming months and years."
NAR's 2023 Profile of International Transactions in U.S. Residential Real Estate surveyed members about transactions with international clients who purchased and sold U.S. residential property from April 2022 through March 2023. Foreign buyers who resided in the U.S. as recent immigrants or who were holding visas that allowed them to live in the U.S. purchased $23.4 billion worth of U.S. existing homes, a 31.4% decrease from the prior year and representing 44% of the dollar volume of purchases. Foreign buyers who lived abroad purchased $29.9 billion worth of existing homes, up 20% from the 12 months prior and accounting for 56% of the dollar volume. International buyers accounted for 2.3% of the $2.3 trillion in existing-home sales during that period.