Key Construction & Real Estate statistics in the United States, 2026

How does construction & real estate in the United States compare? Sector benchmarks

One benchmark figure per monthly report, newest first.

What are the key construction & real estate figures in the United States?

August 2026

• Sun Belt Bifurcation Eliminates Broad Regional Thesis: High-absorption metros (Dallas-Fort Worth, Atlanta, Charlotte, Houston) absorbing >100% of new deliveries with 2%+ job growth; oversupplied markets (Austin, Phoenix, Tampa) facing -1.4% to -3.2% rent declines and 11-14% vacancy rates. Micro-market selectivity now supersedes regional investment thesis as 3.8x spread in absorption rates creates selective repricing opportunities. — Audience Profiles
• Institutional Capital Pivoting to Operational Excellence Over Acquisition Velocity: 71% of CRE investors holding cash rather than deploying (highest survey level in history, Q2 2025); 70% expect 2026-2027 inflection. Investors shifting from acquisition-dominated (2023-2025) to value-add and core-plus strategies emphasizing tenant retention (57% of leasing now renewal-focused) and operational improvements as primary IRR drivers, with 5.5-7% return targets over 5-7 year hold periods replacing aggressive pre-2022 yield-chasing. — Audience Profiles
• Tenant Retention Technology Delivers 8-10 Percentage Point Renewal Rate Arbitrage: Top-quartile operators defending 70-80% renewal rates through 90-day onboarding, behavioral segmentation, and 24-hour maintenance response SLA; industry baseline 57% renewal vs. 63% target. Single intervention (90-day onboarding + behavioral targeting) delivers $290K/year per 1,000-unit uplift vs. median operators; maintaining occupancy at 93%+ in oversupplied markets now depends more on engagement operations than rent-setting capability. — Audience Profiles
• Gen Z Renters Reshaping Industry Economics: Digital-First, ESG-Conscious, Homeownership-Priced-Out: Gen Z represents 23% of renters (10.4M households) and is the only generation adding rental households annually (8-12% growth); Gen Z prioritizes digital-first leasing (63% technology-first preference), sustainability credentials (50% expect documented ESG commitments), and lease flexibility (47% vs. 32% Millennials). Gen Z's lower rent tolerance, higher tech/amenity demands, and permanent rental market participation (homebuying out of reach) compress operator margins vs. pre-pandemic standards, requiring higher capital investment in PropTech, sustainability features, and mobile-first platforms. — Audience Profiles
• Refinancing Maturity Wall ($330B 2026-2027) Creates Distressed Acquisition Opportunity at 15-20% Discounts: 2021-2022 vintage bridge debt maturing at 6.5-7.5% vs. original 3-4% coupons creates $162.1B maturity shock in 2026 and $168B in 2027; properties acquired at 75% LTV now refinancing at 65% LTV requiring 15% additional equity injection or distressed sale. Rational entry points for well-capitalized institutional players acquiring at 15-20% discounts to 2022 valuations; combination of basis protection and lease-up visibility (5-7 year timelines) justifies current valuations despite 2026 rent stagnation. — Audience Profiles
• Texas nonresidential construction totaled $188B in H1 2026 across roughly 5,000 projects, with education ($50B+ pipeline through FY2030) and healthcare ($29.1B project inventory) driving the rotation away from single-family residential, which saw permits decline 7.4% year-over-year through May 2026. — Competitive Benchmark
• The market is bifurcated by segment: mega-contractors like Fluor ($10.9B Texas revenue, #9 nationally) and Turner (+40% revenue growth 2024-2025) concentrate on data-center and power megaprojects, while regional specialists such as Austin Industries ($4.2B) and Bartlett Cocke (~$1.3B) hold an estimated 3-4% share each in institutional work. — Competitive Benchmark
• Subcontractor M&A surged 38.6% year-over-year to 366 transactions in 2025, and total construction/PE deal value reached $28B nationally, signaling accelerating consolidation pressure on small and mid-market firms unable to compete with national roll-ups. — Competitive Benchmark
• Technology adoption is inflecting rapidly: BIM now covers 65% of projects (80% AEC sector adoption), jobsite robotics adoption jumped from 29% to 79% of contractors in one year, and prefabrication is projected to reach 35-45% penetration in institutional construction by 2028, up from 15-20% today. — Competitive Benchmark
• Labor scarcity is the binding constraint industrywide, with the sector needing 349,000-456,000 net new workers through 2027; firms achieving 85%+ crew retention and offering apprenticeship programs are gaining pricing power and schedule reliability advantages over competitors. — Competitive Benchmark
• Northeast and Midwest markets are appreciating 3-4% annually amid a combined 1.8 million-unit housing deficit, while Sun Belt inventory has expanded 32%, driving vacancy to 14% in Austin and 12% in Orlando. — Market Analysis
• FHFA regional data shows the East North Central division appreciating 4.4% year-over-year versus a 0.7% decline in West South Central, with 28 of the 53 largest U.S. metros now posting annual price declines, almost all in Sun Belt geography. — Market Analysis
• A shortage of approximately 499,000 skilled construction workers is pushing wage inflation to 9.2% year-over-year, while 50% steel and 25% aluminum tariffs add roughly $10,900 to the cost of building a home. — Market Analysis
• Regulatory compliance costs now absorb 26.4% of a home's final price nationally, with Northeast markets carrying a 25-45% cost premium over South Central states due to permitting timelines of five to nine months versus three to eight weeks in Sun Belt states. — Market Analysis
• Institutional and build-to-rent capital is repositioning from Sun Belt markets toward Northeast/Midwest secondary metros (St. Louis, Kansas City, Cleveland, Pittsburgh), even as PropTech venture funding surges 340% to $8.2 billion in 2026. — Market Analysis
• NAHB builder confidence has remained below the critical 40-point threshold for 15 consecutive months (index at 34 in July 2026), the longest such streak since 2012, signaling a durable, not temporary, sentiment shift. — Social Listening
• 37% of builders are cutting prices (average 6% discount) and 63% are relying on sales incentives, with mortgage rate buydowns drawing regulatory scrutiny for potentially masking inflated base prices rather than delivering genuine affordability. — Social Listening
• Regulatory and compliance costs now account for over 26% of a new home's price, while construction input costs rose 7.1% year-over-year and insurance premiums surged 22%, compounding margin pressure that fuels public skepticism toward builder pricing claims. — Social Listening
• Tariff-Driven Material Cost Shock at 40-Year High: Effective construction goods tariff rates reached 25-30% in 2026 (40-year high), with steel tariffs at 50%, aluminum at 50%, and copper at 50%. Material costs surged 12.6% annualized in early 2026, with aluminum +40.5% YoY, steel +22.5% YoY, and copper +18.4% YoY, creating unsustainable margin compression for contractors locked into fixed-price contracts. — Trend Analysis
• Contractor Margin Compression: 200-400 Basis Points per 1% Cost Increase: 70-91% of contractors report tariff cost absorption; average markups compressed to 12-18% (from historical 18-25%). Fixed-price contracts negotiated pre-tariff are locking contractors into unsustainable pricing, forcing renegotiation or business model restructuring by Q4 2026. — Trend Analysis
• Structural Labor Shortage: 349,000-456,000 Annual Worker Gap: The construction industry requires 349,000-456,000 net new workers annually through 2027; 40% of skilled workforce exceeds age 45, and 41% of current construction workforce projected to retire by 2031. Wage growth accelerating 4-6% annually; critical skill gaps in estimating, project management, and supply-chain procurement roles. — Trend Analysis
• Rent vs. Buy Economic Shift Destroys Single-Family Demand: Tariff-induced home price increases ($10,900-$17,500 per home) have shifted rent-vs-buy economics decisively toward renting: buying costs ~105% more than renting in 2026 (vs. 35% in 2022). 62% of prospective homebuyers deferring purchases pending rate relief; 88% of recent buyers report financial vulnerability to economic shocks. Build-to-rent communities command 15-25% rent premiums and are emerging as institutional preferred asset class. — Trend Analysis
• AI-Powered Procurement & Material Substitution Converging as Highest-Probability Weak Signal: AI procurement platforms (15-20% adoption among mid-market/large GCs) and material substitution strategies (10-15% adoption) are converging as the highest-probability trends to scale mainstream by H2 2027. Q2 2026 contech funding reached $1B+, with supply-chain tech capturing 34% ($340M). Window of opportunity: Q3-Q4 2026 for builders to pilot AI procurement + design-phase material substitution workflows, capturing 3-6 month structural advantage in 2027. — Trend Analysis

July 2026

• First-time homebuyers represent only 21% of all US home sales in 2025—an all-time low—and their median age has risen to 40 years, reflecting a decade of structurally delayed homeownership driven by affordability barriers, student debt ($40K average for millennials), and historically low inventory. — Audience Profiles
• Northeast primary metros (NYC, Boston, Philadelphia) have 63+ cities with starter homes exceeding $1 million; secondary cities (Hartford, Worcester, Providence, Rochester) are capturing qualified displaced buyers with 25–40% price relief, creating a two-speed market that redefines where first-timers can realistically purchase. — Audience Profiles
• The 2026 ROAD to Housing Act FHA small-dollar mortgage pilot (≤$100K threshold) targets the sub-$300K segment where 60% of first-time demand concentrates—but buyer awareness is estimated at just 5–10% as of July 2026, creating a critical education and outreach gap for lenders, agents, and housing counselors to fill. — Audience Profiles
• Gen Z buyers (53% purchasing solo, 20% of Q2 2026 rate locks) and single women (25% of first-time market, 20M+ homeowners) are the fastest-growing cohorts, but they require co-buying support structures, mobile-first digital platforms, and transparent total-cost modeling that the traditional industry has been slow to develop. — Audience Profiles
• 78% of first-time buyers now start their home search digitally (Zillow, Redfin, Realtor.com); 39% of buyers find their agents through social media; and video-based property marketing generates 403% more inquiries—yet the median buyer still uses a real estate agent (93%) and spends 3 months searching before submitting a first offer, underscoring the enduring hybrid nature of the purchase journey. — Audience Profiles
• Market consolidation is accelerating: the top 10 US homebuilders captured a record 44.7% of single-family closings in 2024, and in the 50 largest US metros they averaged 79.3% combined market share — squeezing regional and smaller builders from the most active markets. — Competitive Benchmark
• Tariffs are structurally repricing construction: 50% steel/aluminum tariffs plus 45% combined lumber duties add an estimated $10,900 per home in costs (NAHB, 2025), with builders absorbing rather than passing through — compressing Lennar's gross margin from 22.3% (FY2024) to 17.0% (Q4 FY2025) and pushing industry-wide incentive spend above 8% of gross sales price. — Competitive Benchmark
• NVR's asset-light land model has become the industry's strategic north star: by controlling 85–95% of lots via option contracts rather than outright ownership, NVR achieves a 10-year average ROIC approaching 60% versus the owned-land industry average of ~15% — a model that Lennar (now >75% optioned) and D.R. Horton (75% controlled) are actively replicating. — Competitive Benchmark
• The mortgage rate buydown has become the decisive competitive weapon: over 60% of US production builders now use rate buydowns, delivering buyers an average new-construction mortgage rate of 5.27% versus 6.26% for existing-home buyers (Q3 2025) — a 99-basis-point structural advantage that directly offsets the resale inventory overhang. — Competitive Benchmark
• Customer satisfaction is the sector's hidden liability: despite volume leadership, D.R. Horton and Lennar rank #19 and #16 among 20 builders in the Lifestory Research New Trust Quotient survey (2025), while D.R. Horton's construction defect legal reserves crossed $1 billion in FY2025, up 72% in two years — creating reputational vulnerability that premium-positioned builders (Taylor Morrison #1, PulteGroup #13) are increasingly exploiting. — Competitive Benchmark
• Section 232 tariffs on steel and aluminum, doubled to 50% in June 2025, drove construction input prices up 12.6% annualized in the first two months of 2026 — the fastest pace since 2022 — adding an estimated $10,900 in direct costs to every new single-family home. — Market Analysis
• The structural housing deficit has widened to 3.8–4.0 million units while single-family starts fell 6.9% in 2025 to approximately 940,000 units annually, running well below the 1.6–1.8 million needed to close the gap; at current production rates, elimination of the deficit would require 10–15 years. — Market Analysis
• First-time buyers have hit a 44-year record low of 21% of all home purchases — the lowest share since NAR began tracking in 1981 — with the median first-time buyer age rising to 40 as affordability collapses under mortgage rates above 6.4% and home prices up 55% since 2020. — Market Analysis
• The top 15 homebuilders now command over 50% of single-family closings, up from 8.7% for the top 10 in 1989, as tariff-driven cost pressures force approximately 25% of smaller private builders into zero-net-profit territory and drive 562 M&A transactions in 2025 alone — up 18% year-over-year. — Market Analysis
• Texas and Florida together issued approximately one-third of all national residential building permits in 2025 (248,000 and 198,000 units respectively), while a labor shortage of 500,000 workers — with 41% of today's tradespeople set to retire by 2031 — costs the sector over $10 billion per year in lost production. — Market Analysis
• Insurance affordability has crossed from a regional crisis into an industry-wide housing market constraint, with insurance now representing 9% of average monthly mortgage payments—the highest share ever recorded—directly eroding buyer purchasing power regardless of mortgage rates. — Social Listening
• Contractor bankruptcies averaged 2,167 per month in late 2025 (up 14% year-over-year from pre-COVID norms of ~1,900), driven by material cost inflation (+6.2% in 2025) outpacing bid price growth (+2.7%), creating structural margin compression throughout the construction value chain. — Social Listening
• Builder sentiment fell to 35 on the NAHB Housing Market Index in June 2026—maintaining a 14-month streak below 40, the worst builder confidence since 2011-2012 foreclosure crisis—reflecting systemic stress anchored in insurance affordability, material costs, and buyer purchasing power erosion. — Social Listening
• Geographic bifurcation is accelerating: South Florida (Miami-Dade, Broward, Tampa) faces structural demand collapse with 72,000 residents fleeing Miami-Dade in 2025, while Southeast inland markets (Nashville, Charlotte, Raleigh, Jacksonville) capture migrating buyers and capital, showing 43-point sentiment gap between most negative (Miami-Dade: score 25) and most positive (Nashville: score 68) regions. — Social Listening
• Construction defect litigation is surging (+15–20% annual increase in filings) as 2023-2024 labor shortage-era quality defects surface in claims, while post-hurricane fraud exposure (80–85% of condo claims tied to wind-driven rain insurance exclusions) and 30+ insurer market exits since 2020 collectively amplify reputational risk and consumer trust erosion across the industry. — Social Listening
• California's Title 24 2025 Energy Code, in enforcement from January 1, 2026, mandates all-electric systems, solar, and battery-ready infrastructure in new construction—creating an estimated $4.8 billion in annual energy savings and a $2–3 trillion commercial retrofit market through 2030. — Trend Analysis
• Smart building IoT adoption has reached approximately 60% in commercial facilities with documented 20–30% energy savings, while 5G private network deployments are accelerating at a 22.8% CAGR, generating 3–5% leasing premiums in upgraded assets. — Trend Analysis
• ConTech and PropTech venture capital investment totaled $3.7 billion through mid-2025—a 100% YoY increase—with construction robotics surging 125% as investors increasingly bet on the net-zero and smart building infrastructure theme. — Trend Analysis
• California's green construction workforce has grown 29% since 2016 (2× the state average), yet a shortage of 2.1 million unfilled skilled trades positions is projected by 2030, with smart building technicians and clean energy installers representing the fastest-growing occupational gap. — Trend Analysis
• Cross-industry convergence is accelerating across six adjacent sectors: buildings-as-energy-prosumers (solar/battery/V2G), tech-led smart building platforms, wellness-certified real estate, climate-tech materials, climate risk financial repricing (16% insurance premium spike in 2026), and EV charging as core building infrastructure (100% EV-ready mandated in new single-family by 2026 code). — Trend Analysis

June 2026

• The median U.S. homebuyer age reached a record 59 years in 2025 — up from 39 just 15 years ago — while first-time buyers fell to a historic low of 21% of all transactions, signaling a fundamental bifurcation between equity-rich older homeowners and affordability-constrained younger cohorts. — Audience Profiles
• The 80+ U.S. population will grow 48% between 2025 and 2030 as the first Baby Boomers turn 80, driving senior housing occupancy to 88.7% nationally and creating a structural supply shortage where absorption outpaces new inventory growth at a 3-to-1 ratio. — Audience Profiles
• Built-to-rent (BTR) deliveries surpassed 130,000 units in 2024 — a 455% increase from pre-pandemic levels — attracting high-income tenants with median household incomes above $100,000, five-plus year average lease tenures, and strong amenity-driven retention rates of 68%. — Audience Profiles
• Sun Belt markets are expanding 3.5× faster than the national average, with Texas gaining 391,000 residents and Florida 197,000 in 2025 alone, concentrating residential demand and BTR institutional capital in markets including Austin, Dallas, Phoenix, Tampa, and Charlotte. — Audience Profiles
• Gen Z buyers represent 4% of the total market and 25% of first-time mortgages as of Q1 2025, displaying distinctly digital-first behaviors — 96% conduct property searches online, 90% expect virtual tours, and 97% reference online reviews — establishing the template for the industry's next dominant consumer cohort. — Audience Profiles
• Compass's $10B acquisition of Anywhere Real Estate (closing H2 2026) creates a residential brokerage platform controlling an estimated 40% of national transaction volume, reshaping competitive dynamics for all remaining independent brokerages. — Competitive Benchmark
• AI adoption shows a critical execution gap: 92% of US real estate firms have launched AI pilots, but only 5% are achieving measurable goals — early adopters capturing disproportionate productivity gains represent a widening moat against laggards. — Competitive Benchmark
• Real estate tokenization platforms have unlocked $1.4 trillion in tokenized assets globally in 2025, with the US leading through SEC-registered structures; the projected $16 trillion market by 2030 represents the largest new competitive battleground for real estate capital. — Competitive Benchmark
• Homebuilder customer satisfaction drops 17 percentage points from the sales phase (92.8%) to the warranty/post-purchase phase (75.8%), identifying post-sale digital experience as the single largest untapped differentiation opportunity in residential real estate. — Competitive Benchmark
• Private equity has deployed over $2 trillion in dry powder into US real estate through 562+ M&A transactions in 2025 (+18.2% YoY), with Blackstone alone managing $1.3 trillion in real estate AUM — fundamentally reshaping competitive dynamics through capital-scale advantages. — Competitive Benchmark
• The U.S. data center real estate market reached $126–135 billion in 2025 at a 10–11% CAGR, anchored by $562 billion in total CRE investment forecast for 2026, with AI infrastructure demand driving hyperscaler capex to a combined $630 billion across the Big Four cloud providers. — Market Analysis
• Power supply constraints have become the sector's most critical bottleneck: Dominion Energy's interconnection queue exceeds 70 gigawatts, nearly 50% of global data center projects face utility-driven delays, and transformer procurement lead times have extended to 2–5 years — effectively capping development in Northern Virginia and forcing geographic redistribution of supply. — Market Analysis
• Private equity deployed $45.7 billion into U.S. data center assets in 2025 (72% of the $63.35 billion total), a 231% year-over-year increase, while sovereign wealth funds committed $120 billion in 2025–2026, highlighting the sector's transformation into core institutional infrastructure. — Market Analysis
• Geographic bifurcation is accelerating: Northern Virginia's share of new construction has declined from 55% to 26% of the Loudoun County market as by-right zoning was eliminated in March 2025, while secondary markets including Columbus (OH), Phoenix, and Atlanta are attracting hyperscale campuses and growing at CAGRs exceeding 40% in certain MISO-region markets. — Market Analysis
• AI-driven workload requirements are forcing a fundamental infrastructure upgrade cycle — power densities are escalating from traditional 5–10 kW per rack to 60–120 kW for current AI builds and projected 250–900 kW by 2027–2028 — triggering a $5.72 billion liquid cooling market (2026) growing at 18.4% CAGR and driving partnerships between data center operators and small modular reactor developers. — Market Analysis
• Active data center opposition efforts grew 875% in 12 months, from 8 jurisdictions in May 2025 to 78 by May 2026, with 69 active moratoria and 4 permanent bans, blocking over $156 billion in projects. — Social Listening
• Public opposition to local data center construction reached 70% by March 2026 (Gallup), a reversal from 51% support in early 2025 — a 40-point swing in nine months driven by energy cost concerns (66%), resource consumption (50%), and quality of life impacts (22%). — Social Listening
• Social media conversation volume around data center opposition surged 157% in six months (Q4 2025–Q2 2026), with Change.org petitions growing 113x year-over-year to 113 active campaigns and approximately 50,000 total signatures. — Social Listening
• Northern Virginia (30% of all US opposition groups), Arizona (Chandler's 7-0 rejection of a $2B project), and New Jersey (65% of voters support a statewide ban) represent the three highest-intensity opposition markets in the United States. — Social Listening
• Six emerging narratives are reshaping the opposition landscape — including 'AI Sacrifice Zones,' Community Benefit Agreements, and Indigenous land rights claims — with 833 organized opposition groups active across 49 states as of Q1 2026. — Social Listening
• Immigration enforcement is creating a structural construction labor crisis: 28% of firms are directly affected, 34–35% of the workforce is immigrant-born, and net immigration inflows are projected to collapse from 2.7M in 2024 to ~321,000 in 2026, threatening up to 1.4M construction jobs under severe enforcement scenarios. — Trend Analysis
• Labor scarcity is driving unprecedented cost escalation: construction wage inflation is running 9–11% in high-demand regions, material costs are up 4–8% due to steel and aluminum tariffs at 40-year highs (50% Section 232), and project abandonment rates have surged 88.2% year-over-year. — Trend Analysis
• Prefabrication and modular construction is accelerating as the primary labor-substitution strategy, with the market reaching $183.4 billion in 2026 (growing to $302B by 2035) and 52% of adopters citing labor availability as the primary driver—offering 20–50% productivity gains over traditional site-built methods. — Trend Analysis
• Technology adoption is at an inflection point: 74% of AEC firms now use AI in at least one phase, BIM adoption exceeds 70%, and PropTech VC investment hit $16.7 billion in 2025 (+67.9% YoY), with AI-native platforms capturing 46% of all ConTech funding as the industry races to compensate for workforce constraints. — Trend Analysis
• Regional exposure is highly uneven: Texas (32.1% of construction workforce at risk), Nevada (26.3%), California (25.5%), and North Carolina (25.5%) face the most acute labor collapse risk, while the data center construction boom ($77.7B in starts in 2025, +190% YoY) and infrastructure mega-projects are competing with residential and commercial construction for an increasingly constrained labor pool. — Trend Analysis

May 2026

• Senior housing occupancy reached 89.5% nationally in Q1 2026 — the 19th consecutive quarterly gain — while new supply sits at a 12-year low, with fewer than 1,500 units delivered in Q3 2025, creating a projected shortfall of 806,000 units by 2030. — Audience Profiles
• Home prices stand 21% above historical norms and only 21% of listings are affordable to households earning $75,000 per year, driving first-time buyers to a record-low 24% market share and pushing median buyer age to an all-time high of 59. — Audience Profiles
• The Southeast multifamily market recorded vacancy above 9% following the delivery of 600,000 new units in 2024, but renter mobility has fallen to multi-decade lows and 57% of all multifamily activity now consists of lease renewals, signaling a retention-first era. — Audience Profiles
• Boomers reclaimed 42% of homebuyer market share in 2024, up from 31% the prior year, while the modular and prefabricated housing sector is growing at a 6.8–7.6% CAGR — reaching an estimated $61 billion by 2031 — as affordability pressures drive demand for alternative construction models. — Audience Profiles
• North Carolina led all U.S. states with 84,064 net domestic migrants in 2024–2025, while the South holds the nation's largest housing deficit at 1.62 million homes; secondary Southeast markets such as Greenville, SC (+6.5% YoY price growth) and Huntsville, AL are emerging as high-growth corridors drawing institutional investor attention. — Audience Profiles
• Turner Construction grew revenue 71% in two years — from $17.1 billion (2023) to $29.2 billion (2025) — driven almost entirely by a pivot to data centers, which now represent 37% of its record $44.3 billion backlog, illustrating how sectoral reallocation rather than market-share competition is the dominant driver of growth. — Competitive Benchmark
• Professional-services firms command a stark margin premium over traditional EPC contractors: AECOM reported a 16.8% adjusted EBITDA margin and a 10.49% ROIC (122% above the 4.73% industry median), compared to Fluor's approximately 3.3% EBITDA margin — a gap of 13 percentage points that reflects the value of exiting at-risk construction. — Competitive Benchmark
• The U.S. Sun Belt accounts for 38% of all nonresidential construction starts ($293.7 billion in 2025), with Texas growing 22.9%, Georgia 43.1%, and Arizona 25.4%; the Mountain division posted the fastest regional growth at +68%, and Southern healthcare starts are projected to surge 46% to $19.9 billion by 2027. — Competitive Benchmark
• Construction industry NPS fell from 45 in 2023 to 34 in 2025 — an 11-point decline in two years — while 98% of North American projects experience delays averaging 37% beyond original schedules; CII-member firms buck this trend with a TRIR of 0.24 versus the 2.2 industry average, a 9x safety performance gap that correlates with institutional client retention. — Competitive Benchmark
• ConTech venture capital investment surpassed $3.7 billion in the first three quarters of 2025 alone — more than double the comparable 2024 period — with AI platforms capturing 66% and robotics 125% more than full-year 2024, while construction M&A reached 562 transactions in 2025 (+18.2% YoY) with private equity driving 54.3% of deals at an average premium of 10.6x EV/EBITDA. — Competitive Benchmark
• U.S. commercial real estate investment is projected to reach $562 billion in 2026, representing a 16% year-over-year increase, with data center and industrial assets capturing the majority of new capital flows. — Market Analysis
• Data center vacancy rates have compressed below 2% nationally — reaching as low as 0.76% in Northern Virginia — while the sector's development pipeline exceeds 5 gigawatts of planned capacity to meet AI and cloud computing demand. — Market Analysis
• The multifamily sector faces a structural undersupply of 4.0 to 4.7 million housing units, driving sustained rent growth of approximately 4% annually despite a near-term new supply wave creating localized softening in Sun Belt markets. — Market Analysis
• Office CMBS delinquency rates have reached a record 12.34% in 2026 — exceeding peak 2008 crisis levels — as a $930 billion refinancing maturity wall forces widespread loan workouts and accelerates office-to-residential conversion activity. — Market Analysis
• Proptech venture investment surged to $16.7 billion in 2025 (a 67.9% year-over-year increase), with AI-native platforms — including four unicorns valued above $1 billion — driving a rapid acceleration in CRE digitalization across underwriting, property management, and transaction workflows. — Market Analysis
• Construction labor shortage at crisis scale: 499,000 workers needed annually in 2026, with 82% of firms reporting hiring difficulty and 45% experiencing project delays — the single largest driver of industry social conversation volume. — Social Listening
• Immigration enforcement is the fastest-growing conversation topic (+40% YoY) with 28% of construction firms reporting direct workforce disruptions; immigrants comprise 1-in-3 construction workers nationally, rising to 57% in drywall and 53% in roofing trades. — Social Listening
• Industry sentiment declining sharply: NAHB Housing Market Index fell to 34 in Q1 2026 (22-month low), while tariff-driven cost inflation (+7.1% annualized), a $10,000–$10,900 per-home tariff impact, and project abandonment rates up 88.2% YoY compound negative industry perception. — Social Listening
• Automation and robotics adoption is the primary positive counter-narrative, with the AI-in-construction market projected to grow from $2.93B to $16.96B by 2030 (26.9% CAGR) and a +35% YoY increase in online discussion as contractors position technology as the long-term labor solution. — Social Listening
• Generational perception gap demands urgent attention: 79% of Gen Z feel priced out of homeownership, yet 60% show growing interest in construction trades — a dual signal that industry communication strategy must simultaneously address affordability crisis narrative and active recruitment of the next workforce generation. — Social Listening
• Construction robotics market is valued at $1.3B in 2026 and projected to reach $11.14B by 2040 (15.39% CAGR), as firms deploy bricklaying, welding, and autonomous equipment robots to offset a 499,000-worker annual labor deficit. — Trend Analysis
• BIM adoption is growing at a 17% CAGR toward a $16B market by 2029, with 68% of major construction firms already adopting BIM; early adopters report 20-30% reduction in project cost overruns and 10-15% faster delivery times. — Trend Analysis
• Immigration enforcement policies threaten to remove 900,000–2.2 million undocumented workers from the construction labor pool — representing an estimated 13–23% of the total construction workforce — accelerating the automation imperative. — Trend Analysis
• PropTech venture capital investment reached $16.7B in 2025 (67.9% YoY growth), with AI-powered platforms growing 42% versus 24% for non-AI platforms, signaling investor conviction in technology-driven real estate transformation. — Trend Analysis
• Green building and ESG requirements are becoming baseline competitive requirements: 40+ U.S. cities have adopted building performance standards, LEED v5 now centers on decarbonization, and institutional tenants show a 3:1 demand-supply gap for low-carbon commercial space. — Trend Analysis

April 2026

• First-time homebuyers have reached a 45-year market share low of 21%, with the median first-time buyer age rising to 40, reflecting the most severe affordability crisis in modern US housing history — median income-to-price ratios now requiring 47.7% of household income for homeownership. — Audience Profiles
• Institutional SFR investors account for 34% of Southeast home purchases (Q3 2025 high), with mega-investors concentrating 45% of holdings across six metros: Atlanta, Phoenix, Dallas, Charlotte, Houston, and Tampa — directly compressing Gen Z and Millennial entry-level inventory. — Audience Profiles
• Remote workers represent a structurally new buyer cohort: 20–21% of remote workers plan to relocate in 2025, with 29% explicitly motivated by homeownership goals, driving sustained net in-migration into Cape Coral, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia growth corridors. — Audience Profiles
• Gen Z renters and Millennial homebuyers are diverging sharply — Gen Z homeownership stands at just 27.1% vs. 55.4% for Millennials, with 72% of Gen Z actively preferring to rent, while co-buying adoption (22% with siblings in 2025 vs. 4% in 2023) signals an emerging workaround to affordability barriers. — Audience Profiles
• Builder incentive packages have reached a 5-year high at 8.7% of gross sales price, including mortgage rate buydowns adopted by 60% of builders, directly targeting price-sensitive Millennial cohorts — while Florida's home insurance costs have surged 18% YoY, reshaping buyer demand geography away from coastal markets toward inland Southeast metros. — Audience Profiles
• The top 10 U.S. homebuilders now command 44.7% of single-family closings — a record high — with D.R. Horton (13.6%), Lennar (11.7%), and PulteGroup (4.6%) leading a sustained consolidation trend that has nearly doubled the top-10 share since 2002. — Competitive Benchmark
• Gross margins are under severe pressure industry-wide: Lennar's gross margin fell to 17.0% in Q4 2025 as tariffs add $10,900–$17,500 per home and a 500,000-worker labor shortage drives wage inflation, prompting JPMorgan to project an average industry gross margin of just 20.7% for 2026. — Competitive Benchmark
• Major builders are deploying record incentive packages to sustain sales velocity — Lennar averaging $60,000 per home (13.3% of sale price), PulteGroup $52,200 (8.7%), and D.R. Horton offering 3.99% FHA mortgage rate buydowns used by 73% of its buyers. — Competitive Benchmark
• Lennar executed the most significant balance sheet restructuring in modern homebuilding history, spinning off its land assets into Millrose Properties REIT and reducing owned land from 75% (Q4 2018) to just 2% (Q4 2025), signaling a sector-wide pivot to asset-light operating models. — Competitive Benchmark
• The Midwest is emerging as the fastest-growing competitive arena: Indianapolis ranked #1 by Zillow for 2026, six of the top 10 hottest U.S. housing markets are Midwest cities, and national builders are actively expanding into Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Michigan through acquisitions and organic community openings. — Competitive Benchmark
• The US faces a documented housing shortage of at least 10 million units (White House, April 2026), with annual housing starts of 1.33M units representing roughly one-seventh of what would be needed for a decade-long catch-up, making structural undersupply the defining dynamic of the industry. — Market Analysis
• New home median prices have converged with resale values — new homes now average $405,300 vs. $414,900 for existing homes (a $9,600 gap, historic low) — reflecting builder incentive use and value engineering as the primary competitive tool against the locked-in existing home market. — Market Analysis
• The construction industry faces a labor shortage of 349,000–456,000 workers in 2026, compounded by an aging workforce (median age 42), with the AGC estimating $2.7–$8.1 billion in annual output lost to unfilled positions. — Market Analysis
• PropTech and ConTech investment surged to $16.7 billion in 2025 (67.9% YoY growth), with AI and robotics capturing 77% of ConTech capital — signaling an accelerating digital transformation in an industry historically ranked among the least digitized sectors of the US economy. — Market Analysis
• The Sun Belt (Texas, Florida, Arizona, Carolinas) accounts for over 60% of new residential construction starts, with Texas (225K permits) and Florida (173K permits) leading nationally, while supply-constrained coastal metros maintain the highest price appreciation and lowest affordability indices. — Market Analysis
• Builder sentiment in the Mountain West dropped to an index of 34 in April 2026, the lowest level since September 2025, driven by tariff-related material cost increases estimated at $17,500 per new home and construction labor shortages leaving a gap of 350,000+ workers nationally. — Social Listening
• Immigration enforcement has disrupted nearly one-third of construction firms, with ICE Notices of Intent to Audit up 10x compared to 2024, disproportionately affecting trades where 34-61% of the workforce is foreign-born. — Social Listening
• First-time homebuyer sentiment reached a historic low, with their share of purchases falling to 21% (lowest since 1981), while online conversations in Denver, Salt Lake City, and Boise show growing frustration with affordability and skepticism toward builder incentive programs. — Social Listening
• Social media platform distribution shows Facebook dominates real estate audience reach (87-92% agent penetration), while TikTok is the fastest-growing channel (+49% YoY engagement) for construction workforce recruitment and housing affordability discourse among Gen Z audiences. — Social Listening
• Emerging narratives — modular/prefab construction, AI-assisted real estate development, ADUs, and climate-resilient building codes — are gaining traction in niche communities and policy circles, with the proptech market reaching $54.66B in 2026 and projected to grow to $185B by 2034. — Social Listening
• The U.S. faces a construction labor crisis of historic proportions: 499,000 new workers are needed in 2026 alone, 41% of the current workforce will retire by 2031, and immigration enforcement disruptions threaten 13%+ of the sector's labor supply — driving off-site construction adoption as the structural mitigation strategy. — Trend Analysis
• Factory-built and modular construction delivers documented 20–50% schedule compression and 20–30% cost reductions, yet U.S. market penetration remains below 5% of housing starts compared to 45% in Nordic markets — representing a $20 billion annual savings opportunity and massive runway for early movers. — Trend Analysis
• The ROAD to Housing Act (passed Senate 89–10 in March 2026) eliminates HUD's chassis requirement for manufactured housing (saving $5,000–$10,000 per unit) and 39 states are actively updating modular certification codes, creating the most favorable regulatory environment for factory-built housing in decades. — Trend Analysis
• Proptech and construction technology investment reached $16.7 billion in 2025 (+67.9% YoY), with AI/robotics commanding over 55% of construction tech capital — yet real-world deployment lags sharply, with only 12% of firms using AI regularly despite 74% partial adoption, creating a near-term execution divide between leaders and laggards. — Trend Analysis
• Over 80% of global real estate value faces high physical climate risk, 40+ U.S. cities have active mandatory Building Performance Standards with penalties up to $5,000/month, and LEED v5 (launched 2025) now requires verified carbon thresholds for top certifications — making ESG integration a financial and competitive necessity, not an elective. — Trend Analysis
• The first baby boomers turned 80 in January 2026, triggering the most consequential senior housing demand wave in history — occupancy reached 89.1% after 18 consecutive quarterly gains, yet only 21,750 units are under construction against a need for 250,000+ by 2027. — Audience Profiles
• Baby boomers control $88.5 trillion (53% of all U.S. household wealth), with the median 75+ household able to afford approximately 50 years of private-pay senior housing rent — creating extraordinary pricing power but an impending affordability crisis for the 44% 'missing middle' senior cohort by 2033. — Audience Profiles
• The median first-time homebuyer age reached an all-time record of 40 years in 2025 (up from 28 in 1991), with first-time buyer market share collapsing to a historic low of 21%, as home prices rose 53% since 2019 while incomes grew only 24%. — Audience Profiles
• Hispanic buyers added a record 441,000 net new homeowners in 2025 — 139.6% of total U.S. homeownership growth — making Latinos the only group sustaining national ownership gains while all other cohorts declined, with projections showing they will drive 56% of new homeowner growth over the next decade. — Audience Profiles
• Memory care represents the highest-value emerging segment in real estate: a 5.4% CAGR through 2035, operating margins above 25%, fewer than 5% of the 7.2 million Alzheimer's patients in purpose-built facilities, and a structural supply-demand gap that will widen as the 85+ population doubles by 2040. — Audience Profiles
• National data center vacancy has fallen below 2%, with over 74% of new capacity under construction already pre-leased — market tightness is giving developers with pre-secured power interconnections a structural pricing and occupancy advantage. — Competitive Benchmark
• Power sourcing has replaced construction cost as the primary site selection criterion: developers with utility PPAs, distributed renewable capacity, or SMR partnerships (Meta-Oklo 1.2 GW; AWS-X-Energy 5 GW) are capturing disproportionate hyperscale demand. — Competitive Benchmark
• Hyperscalers collectively deployed over $350 billion in CapEx in 2025 — a portion increasingly directed to self-build capacity, threatening the build-to-suit economics that sustain third-party developer margins. — Competitive Benchmark
• Immigration enforcement has disrupted the construction workforce of approximately 28% of US construction firms, with data center projects in Texas, Georgia, and the broader Sun Belt bearing elevated timeline risk given their concentrated labor dependency. — Competitive Benchmark
• Liquid cooling adoption is accelerating from 22% (2024) toward a projected majority of new AI-optimized facilities by 2027, representing a $10.7 billion market opportunity by 2030 and a differentiating capability that separates innovation-forward developers from commodity operators. — Competitive Benchmark
• Commercial mortgage originations are projected to reach $805 billion in 2026 (+27% YoY), with private credit and CMBS capturing growing share as Basel III constraints limit bank appetite for CRE exposure. — Market Analysis
• Data centers represent the industry's highest-conviction growth theme, with global capacity forecast to nearly double to 200 GW by 2030 driven by AI infrastructure demand, while industrial net absorption is rebounding from 2024 lows fueled by e-commerce and nearshoring. — Market Analysis
• Office valuations remain 40–60% below 2019 pre-pandemic peaks in most gateway markets, and approximately 17% of all commercial and multifamily mortgage balances mature in 2026, creating both distress risk and opportunistic repositioning. — Market Analysis
• Senior housing occupancy reached 87.4% — near pre-pandemic highs — while new supply growth stalled to record lows, creating a structural undersupply gap that is attracting early-cycle institutional capital. — Market Analysis
• PropTech and ConTech venture investment surged to $16.7 billion in 2025, with AI-powered underwriting, digital twins, and smart building platforms emerging as the highest-ROI technology investments for industry participants. — Market Analysis
• Mortgage lock-in effect holds an estimated 1.7 million homes off the Northeast market (2022-2025), generating the highest negative conversation volume in real estate forums, with Reddit communities r/REBubble and r/RealEstate tracking the topic as the #1 frustration driver among prospective buyers. — Social Listening
• Northeast housing markets dominate national performance rankings, with Connecticut (93.9), New Jersey (89.0), and Rhode Island (87.8) posting composite scores significantly above the national median, driving regional positive sentiment even as national affordability sentiment trends negative at a net -37 score. — Social Listening
• Generational sentiment is sharply bifurcated: Gen Z records the lowest homeownership sentiment in the survey period (only 27.1% homeownership rate vs. 79.9% for Boomers), with 81% reporting inability to afford homes, while Boomers and Gen X homeowners benefit from locked-in equity appreciation. — Social Listening
• The NAR $418M commission settlement aftermath and ongoing DOJ antitrust scrutiny continue to generate reputational crisis signals, with social media backlash against agent commission structures remaining active 12+ months post-settlement and representing the industry top reputational risk. — Social Listening
• The White House April 2026 estimate placing the national housing shortage at 10 million units has become the fastest-growing narrative topic (+45% conversation growth), elevating zoning reform and YIMBY advocacy from niche policy discourse to mainstream political priority across 13 states and major Northeast metros. — Social Listening
• The U.S. data center construction market is projected to absorb $750 billion in capex in 2026, with 23 GW of capacity under construction, establishing digital infrastructure as the single largest demand driver in commercial real estate and creating a direct feedback loop between AI investment and property demand. — Trend Analysis
• Real estate tokenization has reached $10 billion in active market value in 2025 and is projected to scale to $1.4 trillion by 2026 as the GENIUS Act and Digital Asset Market Clarity Act establish the regulatory framework for security token offerings and blockchain-based property ownership in the United States. — Trend Analysis
• AI adoption is bifurcating the industry: 88% of U.S. developers and asset managers are actively piloting AI tools for rent modeling, underwriting, and project scheduling, with early adopters reporting 15-20% ROI improvements and 3x faster underwriting cycles, creating a rapidly widening competitive gap. — Trend Analysis
• The U.S. construction sector faces a structural workforce deficit of 499,000 workers needed by 2026, with 40% of the existing workforce over age 45 and immigration enforcement affecting one-third of firms—a constraint that is expected to limit construction output and sustain elevated project costs through the decade. — Trend Analysis
• PropTech venture capital investment reached $16.7 billion in 2025—a 67.9% year-over-year increase—concentrated in AI-integrated platforms, while office CRE distress reached $116 billion in CMBS delinquencies, signaling a structural bifurcation between tech-enabled asset classes and legacy commercial property types. — Trend Analysis

Where do these figures come from?

Each figure is taken verbatim from a Kenmei Drive intelligence report for construction & real estate in the United States, and links back to it. Reports are produced with AI-assisted research and reviewed by analysts before publication, drawing on publicly available market information. See our methodology for the full process and its limitations.

Cited organizations: U.S. Census Bureau · Self Inc. · Magic Door · Zippia · Arbor · PWC · Vestio Capital · Viking Capital · MMCG · Angel Investors Network · Multi-Housing News · Marcus & Millichap · Lexology · Lorman Education Services · Bridgit · Engineering News-Record · Austin Architects · Mordor Intelligence · Construction Owners · Terrapin Construction Group

How often is this updated?

Every month. Kenmei Drive publishes five new construction & real estate reports for the United States each month, and this page picks up their figures automatically.

All construction & real estate reports · Construction & Real Estate intelligence

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