After several booming years for the Houston multifamily industry, the pace of apartment construction has begun to slow. According to Berkadia’s Houston Construction Pipeline report, the number of planned units citywide is down by almost 22,000 from the fourth quarter of 2022. Meanwhile, multifamily deliveries continue to lag behind 2023 projections.
It’s no surprise there are so many units yet to be delivered in Houston — Berkadia’s recent Multifamily Housing report showed that apartment construction is falling short of projections. Just shy of 4,000 units were delivered in the first quarter, putting the Bayou City off pace to achieve the 17,317 total units forecast to join the market this year.
Excluding projects in the planning stages, there were 33,968 units under construction at the end of first quarter, with the majority located in Northwest Houston. There were also a high number of lease-up projects in that area, with 12 properties either in the pre-leasing stage or newly open to residents in the past several months.
In total, 14,223 units reached the “lease-up” stage of development in Houston during the first quarter. While that’s up from the amount delivered in the fourth quarter of last year, the low number of proposed projects in Houston indicates that lease-up numbers will decrease next quarter.
Here are some of the numbers from Berkadia’s report:
Central Houston
- Lease-up: 1,554 units (5 properties)
- Under construction: 6,075 units (20 properties)
- Planned: 4,543 units (17 properties)
- Total: 12,172 units
Northeast Houston
- Lease-up: 1,737 units (7 properties)
- Under construction: 7,218 units (29 properties)
- Planned: 3,661 units (12 properties)
- Total: 12,616 units
Northwest Houston
- Lease-up: 3,506 units (12 properties)
- Under construction: 10,832 units (33 properties)
- Planned: 1,971 units (7 properties)
- Total: 16,309 units
Southeast Houston
- Lease-up: 1,524 units (4 properties)
- Under construction: 3,711 units (15 properties)
- Planned: 2,066 units (9 properties)
- Total: 7,301 units
Southwest Houston
- Lease-up: 1,325 units (4 properties)
- Under construction: 6,132 units (21 properties)
- Planned: 1,982 units (6 properties)
- Total: 9,439 units