Clark County Housing Shortage

Is there a housing shortage in Clark County? 

Anybody looking for a place to live will tell you that there are not enough options.  Rental prices are increasing rapidly.  The local average monthly rents have gone up by 20-30% over the past few years.

Home sale prices in the lower to medium price range have surpassed the 2007 Bubble prices and have reached new record highs.

Why?

According to the Us Census and Washington State Office of Financial Management, the population is increasing rapidly again.  For some reason, people are moving here in droves.  Population increased by 9000 people from April 2014 to April 2015.


New homes are being constructed.  And the rate of construction ticked up in 2014.

However, it does not appear that home construction is keeping up with the population increase.


According to the Census, there are fewer homes per person in 2015 than during any census year since at least 1990.


 So how many homes do we need?

Census Year
Baseline
1990
2000
2010
Homes in 2015
174,740
174,740
174,740
Required Housing
176,226
175,408
177,826
Housing Shortage
1,486
668
3,086

Depending the baseline, we need somewhere between 668 and 3086 housing units to get back into balance.  On the surface, that does not seem like a big problem.   However, that would only catch us up to today’s population level.  Actually, that would get us to April 2015 – the date of the most recent census estimate.  We are probably further out of balance already.
Population Growth
Baseline Year/
Housing Units Needed
Homes Created
Year

1990
2000
2010

13-'14
7300
2847
2834
2873
2,117
14-'15
9000
3510
3494
3542
2,009


 To keep up with current population growth, we need to construct somewhere between 2800 and 3500 homes per year.  We didn’t come close over the past two years.  


We do appear to have a housing shortage.  And it appears to be getting worse. 

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