Vacancy Rates Stabilize: Vacancy rates in rental...

Vacancy Rates Stabilize: Vacancy rates in rental and home owner housing stabilized in the first quarter, while the rate of home ownership edged up to 63.9%, the Department of Commerce’s Census Bureau said. There were 104.7 million housing units in the nation in the first quarter of 1989, and 93 million were occupied, 59.5 million by owners and 33.6 million by renters. In the first quarter, 63.9% of all occupied units in the nation were occupied by their owners, up from a 63.7% average in 1988. National vacancy rates in the first quarter stabilized at 7.3% in rental housing and 1.5% in home owner housing. It was highest in central cities, 8.1%, and lowest in the suburbs, 6.1%.