With COVID protections beginning to end in some states—including California—in the coming weeks, analysts have been in a mad dash to look at possible outcomes. And while they are varying degrees of eviction impact expected depending on local government guidelines, a new Zillow survey finds real estate industry experts believe the market will not see a major post-eviction ban shift.
As part of the Q3 2021 Zillow Home Price Expectations Survey, more than 100 real estate experts and economists nationwide were asked for their impressions on expected inventory and the state of the market once key pandemic-era housing protections end. The big takeaway: The housing market is expected to stay largely stable as homeowners exit forbearance, while rents and vacancies are not expected to rise dramatically following the end of the federal eviction moratorium.
According to the Zillow survey, industry experts expect home foreclosures to make up the smallest source of available inventory in Q3 at 5.4 percent. Roughly 850,000 borrowers are expected to exit forbearance programs before November 2021.
Panelists said they expect the largest source of available housing inventory will be existing homeowners buying and moving to a different home, at 39.7 percent of the overall supply.
Looking at the rental market, Zillow projects evictions will be roughly 1.5 times what they would typically have been before the pandemic. Zillow estimates there will be more than 485,000 eviction filings in September and October, with a projected 268,000 likely to be evicted. That’s roughly 0.6 percent of the 43.9 million renters in the U.S.
Per the survey, 34 percent of respondents said no change is likely to occur in terms of overall rent increases as a result of the moratoriums ending. Some 26 percent expect rents to rise slightly, while 14 percent of respondents said rents will fall either slightly or modestly. Per the survey, predictions for rents to rise modestly were cast by 20 percent of the panel, and those believing rents will increase significantly accounted for 6 percent.
For more on the survey, click here.