68% of Home Buyers in DC Area Are First-Timers

• August 18, 2014
• 1 Comment

by UrbanTurf Staff

The DC region had one of the highest percentages of first-time home buyers in the country last year, according to a paper published by the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA).

Sixty-eight percent of homebuyers in the region who used conventional or government-backed loans in 2013 were first-timers. States that also had a high percentage of first-timers included Maryland, California, New York and Nevada.

These places are generally associated with high-cost metropolitan areas where job growth and worker mobility are likely to be higher and the share of first-time homebuyers has exceeded 60 percent since 2011.

The FHFA paper found that the proportion of first-time buyers tends to decline as home prices rise. However, that does not appear to be the case in the DC area. As home prices have risen in the region in the past few years, so too has the proportion of first-time buyers. In 2005, the percentage of first-timers using conventional or government-backed loans in the region stood at 52 percent, but that number rose steadily until 2011, when it started hovering at around 69 percent.

For the full paper, click here.

This article originally published at http://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/68_of_conventional_loan_buyers_in_dc_area_are_first-timers/8883

1 Comment

1. 4 Brothers Buy Houses said at 3:40 pm on Tuesday August 19, 2014:
   There's a lot of talk about housing values continuing to rise, but income growth at a standstill. Does anyone happen to know if the stagnant income situation applies to DC? That could help explain why the rising housing values have not affected the number of first-time buyers like it typically does. Just curious.