Report: Low Housing Production Stymies Entry-Level Buyers

Research conducted by U.C. Berkeley's Terner Center for Housing Innovation "concludes that, increasingly, homebuying is becoming a privilege within the purview of only a few wealthy classes of Americans," Adam Brinklow writes.

Although that trend is most pronounced in the Bay Area and other coastal urban markets, "home prices are up more than 25 percent nationwide after inflation compared to 2000, with housing significantly less affordable in almost every major metro area."

Notably, the housing crisis is taking its toll on young and black homebuyers. "The rate of new homebuyers who are black declined from 8.5 percent in 2000 to 6.6 percent 16 years later. And the number of homebuyers under 35 crashed from 36 percent to 31.6 percent."

The report suggests that changes to the supply side of the housing equation could do much to boost ownership among younger and lower-income buyers.