Value of Membership: 6,300 new home starts saved

We continue our series about how your HBA and its affiliate, NAHB, have logged significant victories advocating for members in the legal, legislative and regulatory arenas during 2012. 
Our advocacy efforts have saved the typical home builder about $7,250 per housing start in 2012, including both single-family and multifamily.

Higher loan limit saves 6,300 new home sales in 2012. Home builders and buyers won an important victory in late 2011 when Congress restored higher loan limits through 2013 for FHA-backed mortgages. NAHB advocacy prevented the loss of 6,300 new home sales in 2012 and the 4 reduction of prices of another 20,000 new home sales. NAHB estimates three impacts from the higher FHA loan limits. (1) Sales of more than 1,300 newly constructed homes would not have occurred in 2012 if the loan limits had not been restored. (2) Just over 20,000 home sales would have occurred, but the higher finance costs would have reduced demand, lowering purchase prices by approximately 6% on average. (3) Finally, about 13,000 owners of existing homes in high cost areas would have been unable to sell their homes. That would have resulted in the loss of more than 5,000 new home sales to trade-up buyers. The total value for the industry was $1.904 billion in 2012.