Latest Insights

The Houston region land market slowed in 4Q23 while developers are busy getting residential lots on the ground for the next two years. Developers are the most active buyers in the land market right now as the demand for master planned communities and commercial sites is picking up. Therefore, it truly is a developera€™s market. The total number of single-family home sales amounted to 6,103 in December 2023, marking a decrease of 6.2% compared to December 2022. This decline came after a note-worthy 4.7 percent increase in sales volume in November, which marked the first positive trend in homes sales in 19 months. As development projects complete in the next few years, it will be interesting to see how this will affect home sales with more homes coming on the market.

The Houston Retail market continues to be the healthiest of Houstona€™s commercial real estate markets. The overall vacancy rate has remained steady quarter to quarter, ranging from 4.8% to 5.1%. Additionally, as of 4Q23, Houston recorded a total absorption of 2.8 million SF over the past 12 months. This absorption was predominantly concentrated in the general retail sector (1.8 million SF) and neighborhood center segment (120,000 SF). Because of this, Houston secured the second position nationally in terms of new demand during this period. As the year progresses, we should see more space being absorbed and demand continue to heighten.

The Houston land market was robust in 3Q23 as developers continued to sell sites for master planned communities and commercial development, while speculative land investors kept buying well-placed, large, strategic land tracts. Single-family home sales across the market fell by 10.9% in September 2023 with 6,886 units sold compared to 7,728 units sold in September 2022. Continued market pressure from high interest rates artificially suppresses home sales, and is putting significantly more pressure on commercial real estate transactions for buyers using traditional financing sources. As we head into 4Q23, we expect land sales to continue primarily for residential development with less land trading for commercial development.