Both Trump and Newsom want to regulate corporate ownership of single-family homes. An argument can be made that it is better to regulate an activity before it is a problem than to clean up a problem. Is corporate ownership of houses in California creating affordability problems?
The Largest Corporate Owners Of Homes
Limited information is available about corporate owners, but information about some of the largest owners is available.
Invitation Homes
The December 31, 2023 Form 10-K filing by Invitation Homes Inc. provides reliable numbers about their home ownership on page 59.
The filing states that Invitation Homes owns:
- Northern California: 4,309 homes
- Southern California: 7,553 homes
- Western United States: 31,135 homes
- Total Nationwide: 84,567 homes
The filing also lists the average monthly rent they received for the year ended December 31, 2023:
- Northern California: $2,638 or $1.68 per sq.ft.
- Southern California: $2,962 or $1.74 per sq.ft.
- Western United States: $2,479 or $1.42 per sq.ft.
- Total Nationwide: $2,303 or $1.23 per sq.ft.
Zumper reports San Jose rent has varied between roughly $2,950 to $3,190 from December 2023 through December 2025, with a current value of $2,972 (median).
It is important to look at which homes Invitation Homes owns by looking at their stated overview (pg 56):
Invitation Homes is a leading owner and operator of single-family homes for lease, offering residents high-quality homes in sought-after neighborhoods across the United States. As of December 31, 2023, we own approximately 85,000 homes for lease which are located primarily in 16 core markets across the country. These homes help meet the needs of a growing share of Americans who prefer the ease of a leasing lifestyle over the burden of owning a home. We provide our residents access to updated homes with features they value, as well as close proximity to jobs and access to good schools. The continued demand for our product proves that the choice and flexibility we offer are attractive to many people.
We operate in markets with strong demand drivers, high barriers to entry, and high rent growth potential, primarily in the Western United States, Florida, and the Southeast United States. Through disciplined market and asset selection, as well as through strategic mergers and acquisitions, we designed our owned portfolio to capture the operating benefits of local density as well as economies of scale that we believe cannot be readily replicated. Since our founding in 2012, we have built a proven, vertically integrated operating platform that enables us to effectively and efficiently acquire, renovate, lease, maintain, and manage both the homes we own and those we manage on behalf of others.
The portfolio of homes we own average approximately 1,880 square feet with three bedrooms and two bathrooms, appealing to a resident base that we believe is less transitory than a typical multifamily resident. We invest in the upfront renovation of homes in our portfolio in order to address capital needs, reduce ongoing maintenance costs, and drive resident demand.
This last paragraph is especially interesting with the statement “homes we own average approximately 1,880 square feet with three bedrooms and two bathrooms”.
State Of California, California Research Bureau
The Updated Data on CA Institutional Landlords webpage accessed on January 9, 2026 states: “CRB has updated the data in the Large Single-Family Property Owners in California tool with 2025 Q3 data. The data appears to be nearly complete for 2024 with limited early 2025 data in some counties”. The CRB has created a Large Single-Family Property Owners in California tool and has used it to make observations.
The Summary Findings states, “we were able to identify 79,495 homes that are owned by owners with over 100 parcels. An additional 30,110 are owned by owners with 50-99 parcels. The largest share are owned by owners with 10-49 parcels, totaling 234,815 parcels”. It appears that owning 10+ units is a large owner.
Accessing the tool on January 9, 2026 shows large single-family property ownership percentages, by county of:
- San Mateo 1.8%
- Santa Clara 2.8%
- Alameda 3.5%
- Contra Costa 3.1%
- Santa Cruz 3.7%
Urban Institute – Growing Divergence in Single and Multifamily Rental Prices
The April 2025 report by the Urban Institute (urban.org) provides thoughtful results.
Multifamily rental prices dropped in 2020 while single-family rental prices started climbing at a higher rate. Multifamily rental prices began to rise in 2021, but after 2022, single-family rental prices grew faster than multifamily prices. The pandemic not only had an immediate effect, but was the start of a years-long trend. National household formation is reported to have grown from 122.8 million in 2018 to 127.5 million in 2021 (3.8%). Factors cited include: stimulus checks, fear of overcrowding, remote working, and record-low interest rates.
Housing starts were especially strong from 2021 to 2023. Total housing starts were 1.6 million units in 2021, a level not reached since before the Great Recession. Multifamily starts reached 547,500 units in 2022, a level not reached even before the Great Recession. The increase in supply is part of the reason multifamily prices didn’t rise as fast as single-family rents.
The single-family rental price changes from 2017 to 2024 in San Francisco were 25.5%, the lowest of the 15 most populous metropolitan areas. The multifamily rental price change for San Francisco was 6.5%, again the lowest. For San Jose, the rental price change for single-family was 23.0%, and for multifamily it was 14.0%. For Los Angeles, the values are 46.5% and 32.8%. For Sacramento, the values are 50.7% and 47.1%. For San Diego, the values are 59.4% and 51.3%. For Fresno, the values are 66.0% and 83.5%. The numbers say that the ability or willingness to pay increasing prices is actually lower in San Jose than in many other California cities.
The California Research Bureau states that the Urban Institute found that institutional investors respond to, rather than cause, rent price increases, and that a 2020 study found that institutional investors limited the collapse of prices during the Great Recession.
Summary
“The divergence in SFR and MFR prices indicates that the two housing types do not fully substitute for each other.” The greater increases in areas outside of Silicon Valley are a big contributor to California’s housing policies. Corporate ownership of California housing is not a major contributor to increasing California home prices.
Another Aspect To Large Investor Housing Ownership
Silicon Valley residents and employees look around and they do not see large corporate investors buying up single-family homes as rental properties. However, there is a local presence that buys single family homes – Stanford University.
Stanford University publishes information about the housing it owns.
- On-Campus faculty ownership units: 900
- Off-Campus rental housing for affiliates: 1,600
- Off-Campus faculty ownership units: 250
- Off-Campus housing units for general community: 1,200
The 3,950 units it owns is a significant ownership. Stanford University’s housing ownership helps it attract employees and students. Having the housing near the university reduces commute traffic. It would be hard to argue that its ownership creates problems. It is an organization that aids its people in obtaining housing. Should more companies and government entities do the same? Wouldn’t that make it harder and costlier for people not working for those companies to obtain housing?
The most important difference between Stanford University and the large investors that are targeted for regulation is that Stanford uses home ownership as an alternative to offering a higher salary and doesn’t have an incentive to drive up housing prices. It seems that there is an assumption about large investors that they increase the cost of housing. That may not be true. Large investors have a strong motivation to be very efficient in their ownership costs. An individual may not have the same opportunities. A large investor shouldn’t be banned just because it MIGHT try to use its market size to engage in price manipulations.