Robert Dietz

Robert D. Dietz, Ph.D., is the chief economist and senior vice president for economics and housing policy for NAHB, where his responsibilities include housing market analysis, economic forecasting and industry surveys, and housing policy research. Dr. Dietz has published academic research on the private and social benefits of homeownership, federal tax expenditure estimation, and other housing and tax issues in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Urban Economics, Journal of Housing Research, the National Tax Journal and the NBER Working Paper series. He has testified before the House Ways and Means Committee, the Senate Finance Committee, and the Senate Banking Subcommittee on Economic Policy on housing and economic issues. Prior to joining NAHB in 2005, Dr. Dietz worked as an economist for the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation, specializing in revenue estimation of legislative proposals involving housing, urban development, and other business tax issues. He is a native of Dayton, Ohio and holds a doctorate in economics from The Ohio State University.

Single-Family Starts Weaken in June

Elevated interest rates for home mortgages and construction and development loans kept single-family production and demand in check during June. Overall housing starts increased 3.0% in June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.35 million units, according to a report from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. Census Bureau….

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Considering Housing Inventory: Why Both New and Existing Supply Matters

Total (new and existing) home inventory is an important measure for gauging and forecasting home prices and home construction impacts. The intuition is clear: more inventory yields weaker or declining home price growth and home building activity. Lean inventory levels lead to price growth and gains for home building. The metric “months’ supply” is a…

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