Housing’s Future Leaders

In a time of so much uncertainty, we are grateful for our Housing’s Future Leaders. We designed this program as a learning and networking opportunity for the industry’s next generation of leaders, and since its inception, it’s grown to be so much more than that.

In early March 2020, we held our first meetings: 4 groups, each consisting of 16 people from a range of housing industry disciplines and geographies. With the onset of a pandemic, the purpose of these meetings quickly pivoted to helping members understand the deep and swift impact COVID-19 had on each of our businesses and the industry as a whole.

• We learned from our Builder participants that new home prices were about to skyrocket due to robust demand and construction costs / pressures across the majority of materials (especially lumber). Supply chain issues were causing delays in delivery times. These factors helped form our John Burns Real Estate Consulting new home price forecast of 15% in 2021—the highest among consensus views.

• We learned from our Building Product Manufacturer participants about growth in big project remodel spending, boosted by existing home sales and home price appreciation. Our view is that building products revenue will grow in 2021 with differences by segment. We expect to see growth in both new construction materials and BIG project remodel spending, while SMALL project remodel growth will be tempered by the tremendous DIY remodeling boom in 2020.

• Our Single-Family Rental participants detailed robust demand with high occupancy rates and rising new lease rents. The SFR industry has proven to be quite resilient during COVID-19. Investors and capital are flocking to the SFR market and BTR operators are competing for land. This reiterated our thesis that it is pedal to the metal for the single-family rental industry.