Overview of the United States Residential Multifamily Housing Sector: Fid-Bau Portal

Overview of the United States Residential Multifamily Housing Sector

H. Barnes / J. Bluestein / H. Bernstein

The purpose of the report is to provide overview statistics on the multifamily housing sector in support of assessments directed at technology research needs for multifamily housing. The principle findings are: (1) although single-family detached housing still constitutes the majority of new-housing construction activity in the United States, multifamily housing has been taking an increasing market share in recent years, and in 1982, had 46 percent of the new-construction market (by share of units); (2) the majority of the new multifamily housing construction is in multi-unit buildings, particularly low-rise buildings with five or more units; (3) housing in buildings with five or more units has the smallest multifamily floorspace with relatively little space for individual heating equipment; (4) between 1978 and 1982, over 80 percent of all new multifamily units in low-rise buildings received individual space heating systems; (5) the South and West Regions have most of the new multifamily construction activity while the Northeast and North Central Regions have most of the existing multi-family housing stock.