Rehabitation and remodeling are important tools in addressing the U.S. housing undersupply problem

A recent Harvard study notes that across the U.S., 49% of owner-occupied housing was built before 1980; in certain geographic areas – including Boston, New York and Los Angeles – two-thirds or more of the owner-occupied homes were built before 1980.¹ The aging of the U.S. housing stock is a consequence of the sharp slowdown in new home construction that began in 2007 and that has extended through 2023, per Exhibits 1-2 below.

The continued aging and deterioration of the U.S. housing stock points to a large market of homes in need of rehabilitation. The 2023 Harvard study notes that recent improvement spending has focused not just on cosmetic enhancements but has also been directed at core replacements of basic housing components including roofing and HVAC systems which have extended beyond their functional lifetimes.¹ Pretium and our affiliated lending partner Anchor Loans believe that modernization and rehabilitation of the already existing U.S. housing stock will play an important role in addressing the general problem of housing undersupply across the country. Further, it is likely that the extensive amount of modernization required for many homes will be difficult for typical homeowners to manage and finance; rather, such extensive rehabilitation will often be most conveniently executed by professional developers who purchase homes for sale, bring them up to modern standards, and then subsequently resell the homes once the improvements are complete.

Post-pandemic shifts in living patterns provide additional positive impulse for home improvement

Post-pandemic changes in patterns of housing activity are another force that is likely to put upward pressure on the demand for home improvements. Measures of U.S. office space occupancy remain at below 50% of pre-COVID levels, now three years after the initial pandemic shock (Exhibit 3), suggesting that the move towards work-from-home has become structural. Exhibit 4 relatedly shows a large increase in inflation-adjusted consumer spending on categories such as exercise equipment and furniture since the start of the pandemic. With the growing amount of both work and leisure activity taking place at home, homeowners will demand newer and better housing features that can support these pursuits. Again, it is likely that the extensive home remodeling needed to bring housing quality and size up to the level that can facilitate increased home-centered living activity will often be most efficiently executed by professionals with access to scale economies and efficient and stable financing vehicles.

Demographic trends are supportive of housing rehabilitation

Not only is the U.S. housing stock aging, the population of U.S. homeowners and homebuyers is aging as well. The National Association of Realtors has noted that over 40% of all the 2022 U.S. home purchases were made by homebuyers from the so-called baby-boomer or silent generation cohorts⁶; per Exhibit 5, the share of homes purchased by older homebuyers has trended higher over the past two decades. An older homebuying population will likely be supportive of housing rehabilitation activity: the Harvard home improvement study notes that older homeowners will tend, for example, to value homes modified for improved accessibility and safety. Older homebuyers also have relatively high levels of average net wealth, per Exhibit 6 below, to help facilitate the purchase of improved homes.

The aging of the U.S. housing stock, combined with post-pandemic shifts in lifestyles that benefit from expanded and modernized single-family housing, and demographic trends leading towards an elevated share of older homebuyers, are strong tailwinds for the housing rehabilitation industry. Pretium and Anchor Loans remain constructive on the long-term outlook for the professional home improvement sector and look forward to playing a role in the ongoing process of rehabilitation of the U.S. housing supply.

This is not an offer, advertisement, or solicitation for interests in any Pretium managed vehicle and should not be construed or relied upon as investment advice or as predictive of future market or investment performance. Past performance is not indicative of future results.

CLO debt offers strong average returns due to persistent complexity and liquidity premiums

CLO debt securities have historically delivered strong positive returns across a wide range of economic environments: Exhibit 1, below, shows that BB-rated CLO bonds have outperformed leveraged loans and high yield corporate bonds over the past 3-year, 5-year, 7-year and 9-year horizons. Pretium believes CLO debt has the potential to continue to outperform other assets with comparable ratings profiles: Exhibit 2, for example, shows that BB CLOs currently offer average yields of 13.7%, 6.5% above the yields available on similarly rated corporate bonds. Exhibits 1 and 2 represent the average opportunity accessible through the CLO market – that is, by passively allocating to the entire universe of outstanding BB CLO debt instruments, an investor can earn high average returns relative to the returns available from competing asset classes due to the persistent presence of a CLO complexity premium.

CLO debt offers significant alpha opportunities

In addition to the opportunity for earning strong average index-level returns, the CLO market also features a meaningful amount of return dispersion across different CLO transactions; as a result, there is potential for earning additional alpha returns through judicious active selection of specific CLO bonds. Exhibit 3, for example, shows the annualized total unlevered returns of the underlying loan portfolios for the population of CLOs issued between 2013 and 2022: for a typical quarterly vintage of CLO transactions (e.g., those issued in 2019Q2), the range of loan portfolio returns exceeds 200bp. Given the degree of natural leverage embedded within CLO transaction structures, this amount of return dispersion across loan portfolios translates into an even larger amount of dispersion in returns for junior CLO debt and equity tranches, providing an alpha-rich environment for active CLO investors.

Exhibit 3 highlights one potential means by which active CLO bond investors might outperform the index – namely, by identifying specific CLO managers whose loan portfolios consistently manage to deliver high average returns. In this Exhibit, the loan portfolio returns delivered by one particular CLO manager, here labeled as “Manager X”, are seen to frequently come in near the high ends of the ranges of returns of CLOs issued in nearby time periods. CLO bond investors with tools for and expertise in monitoring CLO manager performance may thus be able to generate alpha by over-allocating to CLO bonds issue by such high-performing managers.

Exhibit 4 shows an alternative sample screen that may be used to actively select CLO bonds with high return potential. The chart in this Exhibit compares the yields on BB CLO bonds traded in the secondary market in the month of February 2023 to a proprietary quantitative measure of risk levels of the bonds. The bond yield and the aggregated risk measure levels are fairly highly correlated, with high risk bonds usually trading at wide spread levels, suggesting the CLO market is roughly efficient. However, there are bonds, such as the ones labeled “Bond Y” and “Bond Z” in the chart, which appear to have high yields relative to the measured amount of risk. CLO investors aided by tools that can similarly help identify bonds with high risk-adjusted yields thus have the potential to generate positive alpha and deliver returns above those earned by the broad CLO index.

The CLO asset class has grown significantly over the past two decades, in large part because of the consistently strong performance of the sector through a wide range of economic scenarios including the global financial crisis episode. The CLO sector offers strong index-level return potential given the high average yields available across the sector’s bonds; there are also meaningful opportunities for earning alpha, or extra returns above the average CLO index, via active management. The potential for earning high returns from CLOs in the current environment suggests that many investors who allocate to sectors such as high yield corporate bonds could benefit from investing as well in CLO debt.

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Pretium’s Credit investment strategies are focused on corporate credit, structured products collateralized by corporate credit, distressed debt and equity and legal opportunities financing. The team invests in broadly syndicated loans, debt and equity of public and private companies, as well as securities issued by CLOs. Investments in high yield securities are subject to greater risk of loss of principal and interest than higher-rated securities and are generally considered to be predominantly speculative with respect to the issuer’s capacity to pay interest and repay principal. Investments in distressed situations expose the investor to the difficulty in obtaining information as to the issuer’s true condition; legal risk, including laws relating to fraudulent conveyances, voidable preferences, lender liability, and bankruptcy; litigation risk; and liquidity risk. In addition, accounts will not be diversified among a wide range of types of securities, industry, markets, or countries. Litigation finance depends on whether the cases in which the fund invests will be successful, will pay the targeted returns and will pay those returns in the anticipated time. Assessing the values, strengths and weaknesses of a case is complex and the outcome is not certain. Should cases, claims, defenses or disputes in which the fund invests prove to be unsuccessful or produce returns below those expected, the performance of the fund could be materially adversely affected. Furthermore, laws and professional regulations in litigation funding can be complex and uncertain and details of certain cases are unlikely to be disclosed because of confidentiality and other restrictions.

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Recipients should note that COVID-19 has, among other things, significantly diminished global economic production and activity of all kinds and has contributed to both volatility and a decline in all financial markets. The ultimate impact of COVID-19 — and the resulting precipitous and near simultaneous decline in economic and commercial activity across several of the world’s largest economies — on global economic conditions, and on the operations, financial condition and performance of any particular industry or business, is impossible to predict, although ongoing and potential additional materially adverse effects, including a further global or regional economic downturn (including a recession) of indeterminate duration and severity, are possible. The extent of COVID-19’s impact will depend on many factors, including the ultimate duration and scope of the public health emergency and the restrictive countermeasures being undertaken, as well as the effectiveness of other governmental, legislative and financial and monetary policy interventions designed to mitigate the crisis and address its negative externalities, all of which are evolving rapidly and may have unpredictable results. Even if and as the spread of the COVID-19 virus itself is substantially contained, it will be difficult to assess what the longer-term impacts of an extended period of unprecedented economic dislocation and disruption will be on future macro- and micro-economic developments, the health of certain industries and businesses, and commercial and consumer behavior.

During the pandemic, both single-family and multifamily construction climbed in response to strong home purchase and rental demand. The contraction in construction over the past nine months has played out differently, with single-family construction falling sharply while multifamily construction has been much slower to react. As of January, single-family starts have been falling for a year and are already down 35% from their pandemic peak; on the other hand, multifamily starts were still reaching new multidecade highs in November¹. The differing trajectories are partly driven by the inherently greater flexibility of single-family homebuilding where each unit is started independently vs. multifamily projects where all units in a structure are started at once. Also, single-family projects typically have shorter timelines and are less complex compared to multifamily projects². Finally, since 95% of singlefamily homes are built for homeowners, their rate of building is especially sensitive to changes in consumer behavior and mortgage rates; on the other hand, 94% of multifamily units are built for investors who have longer-term time horizons³.

The difference in trajectories of single-family vs. multifamily construction has important implications for the rate at which construction backlogs are likely to be worked down. The number of housing units under construction reached record highs during the pandemic driven by the synchronized surge in home purchase and rental demand. The sharp contraction in single-family construction means that as of January, the pace of single-family completions is 45% higher than the pace of new single-family units being permitted¹. As shown in Exhibit 1, single-family construction backlogs have been falling since mid-2022 and at their current pace of decline will be back at pre-pandemic levels by mid-2024. By contrast, multifamily construction backlogs are still rising since multifamily permits remain 70% higher than multifamily completions. As shown in Exhibit 2, multifamily construction backlogs are approaching their all-time highs of 994,000. Even if multifamily construction backlogs began to decline immediately, Pretium estimates that it could take until mid-2026 for multifamily construction backlogs to return to their pre-pandemic levels.

As described in Pretium’s November 2022 Housing Insights, we believe that supply-demand imbalance will remain a central driver of US housing market dynamics⁴. Elevated construction pipelines aren’t enough to resolve a supply-demand imbalance that measures in the millions⁵; however, they do represent both an investment risk and opportunity as developers work their backlogs down. Over the next 12-18 months, we expect single-family homebuilders to continue to be proactive in working to reduce their construction backlogs, but not in a manner broadly disruptive to single-family home prices. The multifamily outlook is cloudier given the continued momentum of construction and the potentially long period over which it will be resolved.

One of the most important debates about the pandemic’s impact on the housing market is whether the surge in demand that began in mid-2020 is a temporary or structural phenomenon. There are numerous indicators of structural pandemic driven changes in household behavior, including the persistence of work-from-home,¹ increased online shopping,² a greater focus on wellness,³ and elevated business formations.⁴ However, many investors still question whether the pandemic simply pulled forward housing demand, especially since rising rates have obscured underlying trends. Consumer surveys find that households continue to expect the pandemic to have a permanent impact on their housing choices.⁵ Also, recently released data from the Census indicates that the pandemic boost to long distance migration accelerated well into 2022 even as many other aspects of life returned to prepandemic patterns.⁶ The Census data is notable because it is a direct measurement of long-distance migration whereas indirect measurements of migration such as postal change of address forms had indicated that migration slowed during 2022.⁷

As shown in Exhibit 1, interstate migration increased meaningfully in the year ending July 1, 2021 – the first year of the pandemic. If the pandemic’s impact on housing demand was mainly temporary in nature, migration levels should have slowed in the second year of the pandemic as its impact on day-today life waned. Instead, interstate migration increased further in the year ending July 1, 2022 to 1.5x pre-pandemic levels. As shown in Exhibit 2, the increase in migration was a combination of larger outflows from states such as California and New York as well as larger inflows into states such as Florida and Texas. Migration levels are likely to decrease as higher mortgage rates and a slowing economy limit households’ financial ability to move; however, online home search activity indicates that the desire to move to a different metro continued to increase in 2H22.⁸ Pretium believes that migration data demonstrates the likely structural impact of the pandemic on long-term housing demand and that this increased demand should become apparent again as economic and rate pressures ease.

Pretium believes single-family rentals are an essential part of the US housing landscape because they provide access to suburban neighborhoods where opportunities and amenities for residents have historically been most abundant.¹ Unfortunately, the housing market has over time struggled to create enough rentals in single-family neighborhoods. Recent research by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies finds that rental deserts — neighborhoods with the fewest rental options — tend to be disproportionately found in suburban locations.² We believe the primary driver of the shortfall of single-family rental options is that relatively few single-family homes have historically been built as rentals. As shown in Exhibit 1, over the past 10 years only 5% of single-family homes were built as rentals — a much smaller proportion than the 18% of existing single-family homes that serve as rentals. The burden to create single-family rentals thus falls on investors purchasing existing homes; however, as described in Pretium’s October Housing Insights the stock of single-family rentals fell during the pandemic despite increased investor activity.³ Build-to-rent capital flows have increased in recent years⁴ and residential land surveys show increased activity in the build-to-rent sector⁵, but even with this increased activity the percent of homes built for rent in the four quarters ending 3Q22 was just 6%.⁶ Overall, the data suggests that there is considerable scope to increase investment in the build-to-rent sector. Not only would this investment broaden access to single-family rentals; but also, it would help to alleviate the long-term housing supply shortage that has worsened housing affordability. 

Growth in the build-to-rent sector would be particularly beneficial in terms of creating new housing supply because the sector has consistently built smaller, more affordable units compared to homes that are built for sale/ownership. As shown in Exhibit 2, the existing stock of single-family rentals is both older and smaller than the existing stock of owned homes. Importantly, homes built for rent in 2021 remain similar in size to existing singlefamily rentals at just over 1,500 sq. ft. By contrast, homes built for sale have become progressively larger over time to the extent that recently built homes for sale are 17% larger than existing owned homes. In other words, even as worsening supply constraints over time have prompted homebuilders to build larger homes for sale, the build-to-rent sector has maintained its focus on creating the affordable home supply that is in greatest need. 

Rising rates have achieved the Federal Reserve’s intended effect of dampening housing demand and bringing down the rate of home price and rent growth. But increased demand was just one side of a historic supply-demand imbalance that drove rapid home price and rent growth during the pandemic. The other side was years of underproduction leading up to the pandemic, especially of single-family homes. The Fed induced rate shock may have brought housing supply & demand back into balance; however, it has also prompted builders and developers to sharply reduce rates of construction, particularly of single-family homes. Consensus forecasts call for rates of construction to continue to decline into 2023, which means the pandemic construction surge lasted less than two years. This wasn’t enough to address housing’s pre-pandemic housing shortage, let alone a post-pandemic housing market that could feature structurally higher levels of demand driven by factors such as hybrid work, increased migration, and an increased focus on the home. Longer-term, Pretium expects that the housing supply shortage is likely to remain a central driver of US housing market dynamics and that this supply shortage will be more pronounced for single-family vs. multifamily homes. 

Permits are the first step in the construction process and monthly permits trends provide an early gauge of overall housing construction levels. In October, US housing permits are down nearly 20% from their early 2022 peaks. As shown in Exhibit 1 this decline is almost entirely driven by declining single-family permits that are down roughly 30%; by contrast, multifamily activity is down just 5%. Single-family permits fell below the rate of single-family completions in June, so homebuilder construction backlogs have been declining since then. On the other hand, multifamily permits remain well above multifamily completions and construction backlogs are still increasing. In the near-term single-family homebuilders have curtailed production more sharply than multifamily developers because of the sensitivity of home purchase demand to rising mortgage rates; over the longer-term, Pretium believes that land and housing supply constraints are also more acutely felt in the single-family market. 

One of the more persistent housing narratives to emerge during the pandemic is that a dramatic increase in investor activity has limited the ability of aspiring homeowners to purchase single-family homes. As widespread as this narrative is, it doesn’t stand up to basic scrutiny. The US homeownership rate rose through the pandemic at the same trajectory it was rising pre-pandemic (Exhibit 1). As of 2Q22, the homeownership rate reached 65.8%, up 170 bps from 2Q19 and above the long-term average of 65.2%. If investor activity has been crowding out individual home purchases the homeownership rate would have at best been flat or potentially declining.

Also, recently released data from the Census indicates that the total stock of single-family rental units fell by more than 100,000 to 14.3 mm in 2021 from 2019; by contrast, the stock of single-family owned homes increased by 4.5 mm during the same period (Exhibit 2). In the single-family market investor activity during the pandemic appears to have created no impediment for owner-occupiers. In 2022, investor activity in the housing market has slowed along with the purchase market and in the coming years we would expect it to continue to have little to no impact on owner-occupier trends.