The Real Estate Bloggers

Student Debt Starting To Hurt Housing and Mortgage Markets

Posted: 04 Mar 2013 08:50 AM PST

We have been saying that one of the great risks to the housing recovery is the huge increase in student debt over the past decade. If the universities get the youth to finance their education they will not be in a position to buy, and borrow, for a home. It is not rocket science…

Now the New York Federal Reserve is chiming in and showing that this is starting to happen.

Total student debt stands at $966 billion as of the fourth quarter of 2012, the N.Y. Fed said in press materials, with a 70% increase in both the number of borrowers and the average balance per person. The overall number of borrowers past due on student loan payments has grown from under 10% in 2004 to 17% in 2012.

Fewer people with student loans are buying homes, according to data in the report. Of borrowers ages 25 to 30 who are taking out new mortgages, the percentage of those with student debt has fallen by half, from nearly 9% in 2005 to just above 4% in 2012.

“The higher burden of student loans and higher delinquencies may affect borrowers’ access to other types of credit and the performance of other debt,” the fed report concluded.

Educational debt is now the largest consumer liability after mortgages. via JSOnline

If 85% of the renters making between $50,000 and $75,000 are paying student loans, and we as a nation are seeing tight credit standards for mortgage debt, the housing market is going to be facing a tough road converting these folks into first time home buyers.

And we all know, first time home buyers are the life blood of the real estate market…