2011 Housing Forecast Dependent on Jobs

Among the various factors cited as key to housing’s health in the new year, employment remains the most obvious and vital component to a market recovery in 2011. Improvements in job growth and security will provide a healing housing market with more financially confident consumers eager to capitalize on high affordability conditions. Nick Timiraos of The Wall Street Journal writes that without more tax credits to boost sales, the housing market is dependent on job growth. If employment improves, so will demand for housing, Timiraos says. Calculated Risk, a website covering financial-and-economic news, expects modest economic and job growth in 2011, in addition to increases in residential investment and construction employment. Housing analyst and former chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, John Tuccillo, says uncertainty is holding the housing market back and feels the most immediate source of new jobs will come at the state and local level, rather than from the federal government.

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