Residential Vacancies and Homeownership Statistics Released for Q4 2021

The U.S. Census Bureau today (2-2-22) released its residential vacancies and homeownership statistics report for Q4 of 2021. The data included in this quarter’s report was not limited by COVID-19 pandemic restrictions and were conducted as person-to-person interviews.

The national vacancy rates in Q4 2021 were 5.6% for rental housing and 0.9% for homeowner housing. The rental vacancy rate was -0.9 percentage points lower than the rate in Q4 2020 of 6.5% and not statistically different from the rate in the Q3 2021 of 5.8%.

The homeowner vacancy rate of 0.9% was -0.1 percentage points lower than the rate in Q4 2020 of 1.0% and was the same as the rate in Q3 2021, 0.9%. The homeownership rate of 65.5% was little changed from the Q4 2020 rate 65.8% and little changed from the Q3 2021 rate of 65.4%.

According to the report, approximately 89.5% of the housing units in the United States in Q4 2021 were occupied with 10.5% being vacant. Owner-occupied housing units made up 58.6% of total housing units, while renter-occupied units made up 30.9% of the inventory in the Q4 2021. Vacant year-round units comprised 7.9% of total housing units, while 2.6% were vacant for seasonal use. Approximately 1.9% of the total units were vacant for rent, 0.5% were vacant for sale only and 0.7% were rented or sold but not yet occupied. Vacant units that were held off market comprised 4.8% of the total housing stock — 1.4% were for occasional use, 0.8% were temporarily occupied by persons with usual residence elsewhere (URE), and 2.6% were vacant for a variety of other reasons.