“I wonder how long before we have a rental market collaspe.”
The rental market and housing market are counterbalanced. When home purchases are soaring, fewer people are renting and the rents tend to go down. When home purchases bottom out, more people start renting and the prices go up.
“The rents are several hundred dollars monthly more than home ownership of a existing home.”
Are you including utilities, maintenance, and real estate taxes in the cost of home ownership?
“Seems to me that when people start buying used homes these buildings will sit empty. At some point the average guy is going to start buying homes again.”
Well, they will only sit empty if the owners either refuse to reprice the apartments, or if they are unable to reprice them because they wouldn’t be able to pay their bills at a lower rent (this is a problem mainly for new construction). Still, there will have to be another housing crash before that happens, because home prices will not go back down to a level affordable for the average worker until that happens.
I do have about 30% equity. But still principal and equity payment is only about 60% of my monthly payment.
Keep an eye on Commercial RE in general, and the CMBS bond market in particular.
That’s an ugly bubble ripe to burst.