{"id":10453,"date":"2026-11-02T18:42:57","date_gmt":"2026-11-02T18:42:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/?p=10453"},"modified":"2026-11-02T18:42:58","modified_gmt":"2026-11-02T18:42:58","slug":"housing-dragged-on-q1-gdp-the-economy-grew-2-5-anyway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/housing-dragged-on-q1-gdp-the-economy-grew-2-5-anyway\/","title":{"rendered":"Housing Dragged on Q1 GDP. The Economy Grew 2.5% Anyway."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Is the Weak U.S. Housing Market a Problem for the Economy?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Housing is a fundamental part of the American dream\u2014whether it\u2019s for a young person aspiring to buy their first home, or for an older American whose home represents decades of accumulated wealth, financial security, and memories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The importance of homeownership isn\u2019t just a theoretical idea. A June 2026 Bank of America study found that 90% of respondents viewed a home as a valuable investment, while 94% believed homeownership provides stability.1<\/sup> The financial significance is also substantial. According to a Census Bureau report released in July, home equity accounted for 31.3% of aggregate household wealth in 2024, excluding the wealthiest 1% of households. Retirement accounts accounted for another 35%.2<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Given these figures, it is understandable that high interest rates (over 7% on a 30-year fixed as I write) and low inventories can make readers worry about the state of the housing market\u2014and by extension, the economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is where it makes sense to separate how Americans tend to think and \u2018feel\u2019 about the housing market, versus how much the housing market actually impacts the broad economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Allow me to start with a hypothetical. When an existing home sells for $400,000, for example, that entire amount does not count as new economic output, since the property already exists. Certain services associated with the transaction, such as real estate commissions, contribute to GDP, but the home’s purchase price largely represents a transfer of ownership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

New construction, residential improvements, and related investment activity have a more direct impact on economic growth. These expenditures are measured primarily through residential fixed investment, which accounted for approximately 3.6% of U.S. GDP in the second quarter of 2026 (see chart below).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

U.S. Residential Fixed Investment \/ U.S. GDP<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Source: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis3<\/sup><\/em><\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As seen on the chart above, housing\u2019s share of total U.S. economic output has been on something of a steady decline over the past 70+ years. Case in point: in Q1 2026, residential fixed investment subtracted 0.29 percentage point from GDP growth, yet the overall economy expanded at a 2.5% annualized rate. In Q2 2026, residential investment added 0.10 percentage point to growth, while real GDP increased 2.2%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To be fair, housing has a wider economic footprint than just residential fixed investment. Spending on housing services, including rental payments and the estimated rental value of owner-occupied homes, generally contributes another roughly 12% of GDP.5<\/sup> That activity is considerably more stable than home sales and new construction, however, since people continue to occupy their homes regardless of how many properties change hands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also want to be fair in giving weight to second-order effects of a middling housing market. Weaker construction can weigh on employment, building materials, furniture purchases, and other housing-related industries. Falling home values can also affect household confidence and spending, while more severe problems in housing finance can spread through the banking system (as I\u2019m sure every reader remembers well).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These are risks worth monitoring, particularly if housing weakness begins to coincide with tighter credit conditions or a broader deterioration in employment and consumer spending.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the latest economic figures send the opposite message.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bottom Line for Investors<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Federal Reserve held its benchmark interest rate steady at its meeting this past week, but readers should understand that whatever decision emerges from the Fed is not likely to directly impact mortgage rates. Remember, the Fed has its most direct influence over short-term interest rates, while longer-term borrowing costs, including 30-year mortgage rates, tend to reflect expectations for inflation, economic growth, and future monetary policy. Mortgage rates also incorporate additional financing risks and costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fed decisions aside, I think the broader lesson here is to keep housing’s challenges in perspective. High borrowing costs and low housing inventory have meaningful consequences for Americans\u2014both young and old\u2014making major financial decisions. I don\u2019t want to minimize that. But from an investor\u2019s perspective, we should be careful about interpreting a difficult housing market as a canary in the coal mine for the entire economy or stock market. It\u2019s just not as impactful as many believe it to be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What the last two quarters show about how much weight housing actually carries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":9971,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[181,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-financial-professionals","category-mitch-on-the-markets"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10453"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10453\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10456,"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10453\/revisions\/10456"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.zacksim.com\/financial-professionals-insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}