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Large institutional investors have increased their single-family rental holdings in six U.S. metro areas since 2018, but they still owned only 1–3% of all single-family homes in those metros by 2024. Recent purchase data also show activity by investors broadly—not just major firms—and rising purchase shares can reflect a shrinking pool of home sales. The evidence points to a qualified return, not a nationwide takeover.
Are Wall Street firms buying houses again?
In some places and by some measures, yes. The clearest ownership evidence comes from a 2026 U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) study of Cincinnati, Dallas, Jacksonville, Nashville, Phoenix and Seattle. From 2018 through 2024, the number of single-family rental homes owned by institutional investors increased in all six metros. The largest year-to-year increases generally came in 2021–2023, and growth declined in 2024.
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That does not establish that large firms are now buying homes everywhere at scale. GAO’s study covers six selected metros, not a nationally representative sample. And purchase activity reported for 2025 varies with the definition of “investor”: one dataset that targets corporate buyers recorded a slight increase in purchase share, while another, broader investor series showed a lower share in the first half of 2025 than at the start of that year.
What counts as an institutional investor?
There is no single cutoff used by every housing data provider. GAO’s institutional-investor definition is unusually large: an investor must own at least 5,000 single-family homes nationally and operate in at least five metropolitan areas. Other datasets count buyers who own three or more properties, or identify corporate buyers from deed records. Those broader definitions include many small and medium-sized landlords that would not ordinarily be called Wall Street firms.
The distinction matters: a percentage of purchases by all investors is not a percentage of homes owned by institutional firms. The figures below measure different things and should not be ranked as though they used one shared definition.
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| Source and period | What it counts | Reported result | How to interpret it |
|---|---|---|---|
| GAO, 2018–2024; six selected metros | Ownership by investors with at least 5,000 single-family homes nationally and operations in at least five metros | By 2024, 1–3% of all single-family homes and 4–22% of single-family rentals in the six metros | Ownership stock in a limited metro sample, not a national estimate or a share of recent purchases. |
| Realtor.com Research, 2025 purchases; report published June 2026 | Deed-based corporate-buyer method intended to capture buy-and-hold investors | About 534,000 homes, or 11.3% of purchases, compared with 11.0% in 2024 | Purchase flow under a method that can miss individual landlords who do not buy through a corporate entity. The count rose slightly while the broader market contracted. |
| Cotality, June 2025 | Arm’s-length detached-home and townhome purchases by owners with at least three properties | Investors accounted for 29% of single-family purchases, versus 25% in June 2024 | A broad investor category. Cotality said the increase in purchase share was largely driven by lower owner-occupied transaction volume. |
| Redfin, Q1 2026, as reported by CRS | Investor purchases; investor sizes not separated | 19% of single-family homes sold | Not directly comparable with datasets that identify buyer size or corporate structure. |
How many homes do large investors own?
In GAO’s six-metro study, institutional investors meeting its 5,000-home threshold owned 1–3% of all single-family homes by 2024. Their share was higher when the denominator was only single-family rentals: it ranged from 4% in Seattle to 22% in Jacksonville. Those rental-market figures describe local concentrations; they do not mean that institutions owned 4–22% of all homes in those cities.
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Why can an investor share rise without a buying surge?
A purchase share is a fraction: investor purchases divided by all purchases during a period. If owner-occupant transactions fall faster than investor transactions, investors can represent a larger share even if their own buying is flat or down. A share alone does not reveal whether investor purchase counts rose, whether the whole market shrank, or whether firms accumulated more homes after sales.
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The datasets also capture different buyers. Realtor.com’s 2025 analysis attributed about two-thirds of its counted investor purchases to small investors. Cotality’s three-or-more-properties series found medium investors—owners with 10–99 properties—grew from 6% of the single-family purchase market in June 2024 to 10% in June 2025. In Cotality’s June 2025 breakdown, small investors accounted for 14% of purchases, large investors for 3%, and mega investors for 2%. These are purchase shares, not ownership shares.
Meanwhile, Realtor.com reported that mega-investor purchases remained nearly 70% below their 2021 peak, and large-investor purchases were about 30% lower. That is compatible with a modest rise in a broader investor-purchase share: smaller buyers can be more active while the largest buyers remain below an earlier peak.
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National summaries conceal substantial local differences. Realtor.com’s 2025 data show three distinct patterns:
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- Atlanta: investors were net sellers by nearly 1,800 properties in 2025.
- Kansas City: investors bought 21.2% of homes sold; small investors were especially active in lower-priced homes.
- Charlotte: the investor share declined from 18.5% in 2022 to 13.6% in 2025 as mega investors retreated.
These city-level findings use Realtor.com’s investor definitions and should not be treated as measurements of institutional ownership. They show why a nationwide purchase percentage cannot tell a buyer, renter or homeowner what is happening in a particular neighborhood.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Do institutional investors make homes less affordable?
The effects can differ by market and by what investors do with the homes they buy. The St. Louis Fed’s October 2025 discussion traces the growth of single-family rentals after the foreclosure crisis, their later resurgence, and competing research on neighborhood prices and renter outcomes. That discussion is context, not a single definitive causal estimate.
Institutional ownership can add rental supply, bring distressed homes back into use through renovation, and give sellers another source of demand. On the other hand, concentrated acquisitions may mean more competition for some entry-level homes or affect rents in particular areas. CRS says it is unclear how often institutional investors and owner-occupants compete for the same homes. The available figures do not establish that investor buying by itself caused national home prices or rents to rise.
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For housing professionals, including painters and other renovation contractors, a change in ownership may mean a different client or property manager, but the market statistics do not establish a general change in renovation demand, project volume or pay. Those outcomes depend on the property, location and owner’s plans.
What does the 2026 federal law change?
The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act became Public Law 119-101 on July 11, 2026. According to the CRS summary, Section 1001 restricts for-profit companies that own at least 350 homes from purchasing additional single-family homes defined as properties with one or two units. The prohibition and enforcement provisions have a delayed effective date: they take effect 180 days after enactment, rather than immediately, and are repealed 15 years after that effective date.
The law includes exceptions for certain homes built or substantially rehabilitated for sale or rental, specified homeownership programs, acquisitions to satisfy debt or through foreclosure, qualifying rental communities for people aged 55 and older, and certain transfers. It also provides for annual ownership reporting and a renter outreach resource. The CRS summary describes Congress’s stated intent as expanding the number of single-family homes available for individual purchase and preserving and expanding that supply; this is the law’s stated aim, not a measured outcome.
Quick Recap
How to read claims about investors and housing
- Check the denominator: all homes, rental homes, homes sold, or purchases during a period are not interchangeable.
- Check the investor cutoff: an owner with three properties is not the same category as a firm with at least 5,000 homes across multiple metros.
- Check the geography and dates: a six-metro ownership study, a city purchase share and a national transaction estimate answer different questions.
- Separate counts from shares: a higher share may reflect fewer total sales, not a large increase in investor purchases.
- Distinguish buying from owning: transaction data measure activity over a period; ownership data describe a stock of properties at a point in time.
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