‘We will not become a nation of renters’: Trump vows more affordability in U.S. housing market

President Trump on Wednesday pledged to tackle housing affordability, highlighting his effort to ban large institutional investors from purchasing single-family homes.

He hammered home his housing agenda a day after signing an executive order advancing his plan to ban large institutional investors from buying single-family homes.

“They buy 500 houses, they buy hundreds of thousands. They buy 500 houses. They can take depreciation,” Mr. Trump said in a keynote speech to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

“They can, but homes are built for people, not for corporations, and America will not become a nation of renters,” the president said. “We’re not going to do that.”

His order outlined a multipart process designed to block institutional home purchases, though it did not immediately impose any new rules or regulations. Instead, it orders multiple government agencies to look for ways to prohibit the acquisition of homes by entities considered large in scale.

Mr. Trump said Wednesday that he’ll call on Congress to make the ban permanent. The idea has long been championed by Democrats in Congress.

Rep. Ro Khanna, California Democrat and a frequent Trump critic, has introduced a bill that would block institutional investors from buying single-family homes. He said he was behind the president’s proposal. 

“I support the effort to stop private equity from buying up single-family homes,” Mr. Khanna told The Washington Times. “I support this. I have had a bill out for many years about stopping corporate Wall Street landlords, and I hope we can actually get legislation through because executive orders can be sued and tied up in court.” 

Economists, however, are split on the plan. Kevin Erdmann, a senior affiliated scholar at George Mason University, said institutional investors own such a small percentage of the housing market, it’s difficult to see the president’s plan having an impact.

As Mr. Erdmann sees it, increasing housing supply and making it easier for buyers to obtain mortgages would be a more effective way to bring down housing costs. 

James Mohs, an economist, said even if institutional investors own 2% to 3% of the housing market, opening up that small amount to families will make a difference. By eliminating institutional investors, the Trump administration is, in fact, increasing the supply of available homes, he said. 

In recent days, Mr. Trump floated new ideas to address soaring housing prices. He proposed allowing Americans to withdraw money from their 401(k) retirement funds and has ordered Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to purchase more than $2 billion in mortgage bonds.

Mr. Trump also has proposed capping credit card interest fees at 10% for one year, saying high fees are reducing the amount of money that Americans have available to spend on mortgages or to make a down payment on a house.

“Homeownership has always been a symbol of health and vigor of American society, but that goal fell out of reach for millions of people in the Biden era because interest rates went up so high,” Mr. Trump said in Davos. “I’m taking action to bring back this bedrock of the American dream.”

Blackstone, the largest private-equity owner of apartments in the U.S. with more than 230,000 units, has spent billions of dollars in recent years purchasing real estate companies such as AIR Communities, American Campus Communities and Tricon Residential.

However, no one is sure how much of the overall housing market is owned by institutional investors. Some estimates have put the total figure around 2% or 3%, but in hot real estate markets such as Phoenix, Miami or Las Vegas, the amount can be as high as 20%.

Sun Belt cities have been a particular target for institutional homeownership. A 2024 analysis by the Government Accountability Office said large institutions owned 25% of rental homes in Atlanta and 18% in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Home prices have soared by more than 50% since 2019, and the median home price has risen to $409,200. In response, home buying has declined over the past three years amid rising mortgage rates and housing costs.

Institutional investors are able to purchase homes with all-cash offers and have the money to conduct renovations, so they rarely argue with sellers about repairs or upgrades.