Extreme Swings

In the summer of 2025, the US hit a milestone going back to 2013 when the data started to be collected, there were nearly 500,000 more home sellers than buyers. 

Contrast that to the fall of 2021 when the metrics were flipped. There were 900,000 more buyers than sellers. The real estate pendulum swings fast and wide but this is unprecedented. 

What's the result of all this? From 2022 through the end of 2025, projections are that the US will sell 3.1 million less homes. Both 2024 and 2025 projected home sales will be 20% less than the 25 year average. Thats 20% less work for real estate brokers, 20% less jobs for home moving businesses, 20% less U-Hauls rented, the list goes on and on. 

What does this mean for self storage?

Here is the very rough math: according to Extra Space, in 2024, 55% of all self storage users rented because they were moving. 60% of those are home owners, which means that 33% of all self storage is used by moving home owners.  

 

 

Tallying up the the math for the 2022-2025, there are 1,870,000 self storage units that wont be rented because of the lower than average home sales. Thats like removing 5% of the entire demand for all self storage.  

Extra Space’s Year over Year rent growth in 2024 was positive 0.2% and YTD in 2025 is positive 0.1%. 

There are few other real estate asset classes where you could take 5% of the total demand out of the market and still maintain positive rent growth. 

When the pendulum swings back in favor of higher home sales, demand will come roaring back and the industry will see huge tailwinds of higher demand combined with the lower new construction.