Boise Hit By Pandemic Housing Slump With Inventory Glut

Across the nation, the overall US housing inventory in July was 44 percent below where it was in July of 2019. However, Boise's available housing inventory charted 34 percent above 2019 levels and--get this--141 percent above July 2021!

Considering there is a slug of newly constructed homes about to hit the Boise market, national analysts and research firms are predicting home prices will fall in the Boise area after the pandemic surge of immigrants to Idaho from California, Texas and more densely populated neighboring states like Washington and Oregon.

Unlike 2008, builders are wary about being caught off guard. And the Boise market is still considered to be undersupplied to adequately house the population. So there is hope that the brisk flow of new building permits will slow as the inventory is absorbed despite an affordability issue.

According to Moody's Analytics, Boise's home prices are "overvalued by 72 percent. By comparison, Austin is also overvalued by 61 percent. Following a principle of economics, the markets that have shown the higher levels of price appreciation will likely experience greater price contraction.