Sigh. NO it didn't. One fact of life: new construction does NOT lead to lower housing prices. Sad, but true.

So what did? Likely COVID. The _only_ way to decrease the housing prices is to decrease the population. As proven by countless cities, including the world's most liveable Copenhagen.

So does my prediction hold for Austin? Let's see.

Austin TX population in 2019 (ACS estimate, data series ACSDP1Y2019.DP05): 979263.

2021 (ACSDP1Y2021.DP05): 944658

2023 (ACSDP1Y2023.DP05): 979700.

2024 (ACSDP5Y2024.DP05): 979539.

So yep, my prediction holds true. The housing prices in Austin were stagnant because its population decreased during COVID and barely recovered to pre-COVID levels.

Want another prediction? Seattle's home prices will fall down, because its population is now (likely) decreasing. Not because of a rush of new construction. We'll see updated population released stats in April.

Edit: I sent a letter to the editor of Pew. We'll see if they have a shred of honesty (doubt it).

Edit 2: honest researchers take care to control for other factors before jumping to conclusions. For example, they could have found a comparable city that also had falling rents but _no_ significant new construction.

And hey, I did that. According to https://vitalsigns.mtc.ca.gov/indicators/asking-rents the rental price in SF was $4060 in 2019, and it fell to the low level $3319 in 2024 before starting to climb in 2025. Can you guess what was happening with its population?

There are many mistakes here.

The population numbers you have reported are misleading because they use 5 year estimated numbers. The better estimate is 993,588.

The population actually grew from 2021.

Even if you were right, the rents fell down by more than 19% after accounting for inflation. I’m not sure what you are trying to say?