Ginevra Joyce-Myers of Raleigh.
North Carolina’s housing shortage is no longer an abstract policy debate. It shows up in the rent check that rises every renewal, in the young teacher who can’t afford a home in the town where she works, and in the growing number of neighborhoods where single-family houses that once went to first-time buyers are now rentals.
Single-family rentals are easy to blame, and the frustration is understandable. When investors compete with families for the same modest homes, prices go up and the path to ownership gets harder. But it’s worth remembering that these rentals also serve a real need. Many families want the space and stability of a house but aren’t ready or able to buy, and for them a rental is often the best option available.
Both things can be true, and both point to the same underlying problem: we simply haven’t built enough homes. When supply is tight, every housing choice becomes a competition, and ordinary families lose.
The solution is not to pit renters against buyers or to vilify one type of housing. It’s to make it easier to build more of it. That means updating outdated zoning rules, speeding up permitting, and making room for the starter homes, townhomes, and smaller lots that have become too rare.
I urge our state and local leaders to focus less on who owns the houses and more on how many houses exist. Build more, and the rest gets easier.