International homebuyers purchase record low number of existing homes National Association of Realtors (NAR) has been tracking data since 2009.
On Wednesday, the trade group said in a report 2024 U.S. Residential Real Estate International Transactions Report In the year to March 2024, the number of existing homes purchased by international buyers fell 36% year-on-year to 54,300.
Sales of these home purchases were $42 billion, also down 21.2% year-over-year. The decline comes despite foreign buyers’ average purchase price ($780,300) and median purchase price ($475,000) hitting their highest levels on NAR records, up 21.9% and 19.8% respectively from a year ago.
“A stronger dollar makes international travel cheaper for Americans, but makes U.S. housing more expensive for foreigners,” NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun said in a statement. “As a result, foreign buying It’s no surprise that home sales are down in the U.S. Historically low home inventory and rising prices remain significant factors limiting home sales for both U.S. and international buyers.
Foreign resident buyers who lived in the United States as new immigrants or held visas that allowed them to live in the United States purchased $22.6 billion worth of existing U.S. homes. This was down 3.4% from the previous year and accounted for 54% of home sales purchased by international buyers.
On the other hand, nonresident foreign buyers living abroad accounted for 46% of total sales and purchased $19.4 billion of existing home inventory, a 35% year-over-year decrease.
In total, foreign buyers accounted for 2% of the $2.1 trillion in existing U.S. home sales in the 12 months through March.
International buyers (50%) are more likely to purchase a home with cash than domestic buyers (28%). Nonresident foreign buyers (68%) are more likely than resident foreign buyers (36%) to purchase in all cash. International buyers with the highest proportion of all-cash purchases come from Canada (69%) and China (68%).
Nearly half of international buyers are from Canada (13%), China (11%), Mexico (11%) and India (10%). The top destinations for foreign buyers are Florida (20%), Texas (13%), California (11%) and Arizona (5%). Georgia, New Jersey, New York and North Carolina each hold 4%.
Chinese buyers had the highest average purchase price at $1.3 million, and their total sales of $7.5 billion were the most of any international buyer, a trend that dates back to 2013. , India ($4.1 billion buyers), Mexico ($2.8 billion) and Colombia ($700 million) rounded out the top five countries of origin by sales.
