Zelman Insights

A Decade Divided, The Troubling Trajectory of Demographics

July 23, 2026 by Ryan McKeveny & Kevin Kaczmarek

Is the housing shortage overstated? In our recently published report, A Decade Divided, The Troubling Trajectory of Demographics, we challenge the prevailing narrative of a severe housing shortage. Our analysis of declining birth rates, aging populations, and reduced immigration levels are leading to slower household growth projections for the coming decade.

While the first few years of the decade saw record household growth driven by immigration surges and pandemic-related factors, the market has shifted to a more balanced state with modest oversupply in multifamily housing and modest undersupply in single-family homes.

Our analysis argues that current market conditions indicate reasonable balance between supply and demand overall, while acknowledging ongoing challenges in providing truly affordable housing for the lowest income families.

Filed Under
New Home Sales

Manufactured Housing: Share Gains, But Not in a Straight Line

July 16, 2026 by Jesse Lederman

Manufactured housing remains one of the more compelling long-term affordability stories in housing, even if the near-term recovery is likely to be gradual rather than linear...

Filed Under
Manufactured Housing

Price Doing the Heavy Lifting for Supplier Growth; Still Not Enough for Margins

June 25, 2026 by McClaran Hayes

Building products revenue growth has been accelerating for the past four months. Specifically, days-adjusted revenue growth has inflected from a 3% decline in January to 2% growth in May. While acceleration throughout the first half of the year does appear to be a positive development, we believe the underlying trend is more nuanced...

Filed Under
Building Products

The Many Faces of Homebuilder M&A: What an Active Deal Market Means for Owners

June 22, 2026 by Tony McGill

Homebuilding M&A has entered one of its most active periods in memory. As our Research colleagues recently highlighted, much of the headline activity has centered on the arrival of large, patient, and often foreign capital, including Sekisui House’s acquisition of M.D.C. Holdings, Sumitomo Forestry’s acquisition of Tri Pointe Homes, and Berkshire Hathaway’s proposed acquisition of Taylor Morrison amongst the most prominent examples...

Homebuilding M&A Enters a New Phase as Private Consolidators Take Charge

June 12, 2026 by Alan Ratner

After a multi-decade period in which public builders steadily took market share from smaller private companies, reaching 53% of national new home sales in 2025, the most interesting development in homebuilding M&A today is not simply that consolidation is accelerating. It is who is doing the consolidating...

Filed Under
Homebuilding M&A

Foreclosure Tides are Rising, But Far from a Wave

June 08, 2026 by Ryan McKeveny

Although a rising tide of foreclosures is justifiably starting to garner some headlines, aggregate risk is still relatively muted – with the increases coming from all-time lows and current levels still far below historical averages. Specifically, as of 1Q26, just 0.6% of all mortgages were in the foreclosure process, up 15 basis points year over year, but still less than half the 1.4% long-term average since 1979. Foreclosure starts are also gravitating higher, but at 0.20% of outstanding mortgages, the quarterly start rate also remains roughly half of its historical average. These dynamics certainly bare monitoring, but for now, the overall trend is one of slow normalization and not a fast-rising wave...

Filed Under
Existing Home Sales Homeownership Mortgage Mortgage Rates

Manufactured Housing Backdrop Choppy, But Planning For the Future

June 01, 2026 by Jesse Lederman

Recently, Cavco (CVCO) and Champion Homes (SKY) reported fiscal 4Q26 earnings (calendar 1Q26). The message was fairly consistent: (1) demand is uneven, as is true across the rest of housing given volatile interest rates and macro uncertainty, (2) input-cost inflation is the biggest immediate headwind, and (3) both companies are still investing for a bigger affordable-housing opportunity down the road. In other words, the destination still looks attractive, but the next few quarters may be uneven...

Filed Under
Manufactured Housing

Home-Related Consumer Demand Is Pressured, but the Higher-End Is Holding Up

May 26, 2026 by Marius Morar

Furniture and home-related demand was uneven in 1Q26. January and February were disrupted by winter storms, which weighed on traffic, caused store closures, and disrupted deliveries and replenishment across both home improvement and furniture retailers. Then the war in Iran began, uncertainty increased, gas prices became a more visible pressure point for consumers, and demand softened again in March. We heard that in our conversations at the High Point furniture show, and it showed up in earnings commentary from retailers and suppliers. However, this is not the same as saying the category simply collapsed...

Filed Under
Consumer

Origination Market Shares from 2025 Show UWM and RKT Still Dominating

May 19, 2026 by Kevin Kaczmarek

Recently-released 2025 loan-level origination data show United Wholesale (UWM) and Rocket / Mr. Cooper (RKT) held on to their top two rankings, with UWM again being the market leader in first-lien purchase originations and RKT in first-lien refinances as well as closed-end second liens...

Filed Under
Mortgage Mortgage Rates

Despite Worries, Suppliers Expect to Manage Through Price/Cost Headwinds

May 08, 2026 by McClaran Hayes

While headlines surrounding geopolitical turmoil have sent oil prices up and down on a daily basis over the past two months, at this point, oil prices are on track to be up by 50%-plus on a year-over-year basis from 2Q26 through 4Q26...

Filed Under
Building Products