This chart illustrates which institutional homebuyers are currently the most active

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During the Pandemic Housing Boom, which spanned from summer 2020 to spring 2022, institutional homebuying accelerated due to a perfect storm of soaring rents, low interest rates, easy access to capital, and spiking home prices that proved too enticing to resist. However, that institutional frenzy quickly fizzled out once interest rates spiked.

The big question moving forward is, if interest rates fall meaningfully, by how much will institutional single-family home buying pick up?

To better understand which institutional homebuyers are already the most active—and the least active—ResiClub reached out to the residential real estate data pros at Parcl Labs. (Earlier this month, Parcl Labs provided data on which institutional investors are selling the most homes—today’s story is the opposite).

Parcl Labs provided ResiClub the following data 👇

The Parcl Labs data makes it clear that institutional homebuying remains fairly tame right now.

Among these 21 major institutional operators, only one increased its total home portfolio over the past three months by over 2.0%. That was Tiber Capital, which acquired 165 single-family homes over the past three months and increased its total home portfolio by 2.3%.

On a total basis, Progress Residential acquired the most, adding 1,140 homes over the past three months.

Institutional homebuying often gets exaggerated online

Last week, former MMA fighter Jake Shields tweeted out that 44% of U.S. single-family home purchases this year were made by private equity firms. The article he shared was an obscure post on Medium, which cited a Business Insider article and linked to an article on The Atlantic’s website. Neither of those professional outlets actually cited the 44% figure.

The 44% figure was completely made up—and the tweet got over 600,000 online views.

The truth: In aggregate, Parcl Labs calculates institutional operators own around 0.73% of the total U.S. single-family housing stock (less than 1 in 100 homes), with it reaching as high as 4.4% in the Atlanta-metro market. Despite institutional investors jumping into the housing market following the 2008 housing bust, most landlords are still operators with between 1 to 10 homes.

On Tuesday, ResiClub published an article showcasing the economic and housing forecasts by Goldman Sachs chief economist Jan Hatzius through 2027. At that time, Hatzius expressed the belief that "March at this point is half-priced [for a Fed rate cut], and I think a lot would have to happen for them to go that soon." However, following Wednesday's announcement that the median FOMC member foresees three cuts to the Federal Funds rate in 2024, Goldman Sachs now believes that the first Fed cut is coming in March.

The Fed news also coincided with the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate falling from 7.09% to 6.64% this week.