In the media

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Our research is regularly cited in national and local news outlets; below is some of our recent press coverage.

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The Wall Street Journal

Rising Interest Rates Imperil Remodeling Mania

Homeowners, excluding landlords and house flippers, spent $418 billion on home improvement and repair over the 12 months that ended Sept. 30, according to the Leading Indicator of Remodeling Activity, which was developed by Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies.

The Atlantic

Don't Buy a Home (Ever)

Granted, the past couple of years may have been an aberration; people went crazy for home remodeling during the pandemic. But even pre-pandemic research cuts against common understandings of how homeowners use their equity.

Katie Couric Media

With a Recession Looming, Is Now a Good Time to Remodel?

Homeowners spent $337 billion in improvements and repairs in 2020, $368 billion in 2021, and are projected to shell out $427 billion by the end of this year, according to data from the Joint Center for Housing Studies.

The New York Times

As Gen X and Boomers Age, They Confront Living Alone

People in this group often face the reality that “it’s more expensive to get a smaller condo than the single family you’re selling — and that presumes the condo exists, which may not be the case,” said Jennifer Molinsky, director of the Housing an Aging Society Program at Harvard University.

The New York Times

Is Homeownership Slipping Even Further Out of Reach for New Yorkers?

The income required to afford a home in, for example, the middle-third of the New York City area market in September 2019 was about $117,450, assuming a 30-year fixed rate mortgage, according to an analysis by the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies.

The Atlantic

The US Needs More Housing Than Almost Anyone Can Imagine

Nationally, “household growth and new construction have been essentially coincident for the last seven or eight years,” said Chris Herbert, of Harvard. “Typically, housing construction exceeds household formation by about 20 percent, because we’re always removing housing that has outlived its useful life. We haven’t been doing that for a long time. Just by that very simple measure, we’re not building enough.”

Boston.com

Here today. Gone tomorrow. Back someday because of climate change.

“New England is predicted by some as being a receiver community,” said Carlos Martín, a project director at the Remodeling Futures Program at the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard. “I’m a little more skeptical of that because I think there are going to be places like Atlanta and Orlando that can continue to receive more population because they’re closer to where people want to be.”