During the past decade, builders added more than 7,800 homes to St. Joseph County, according to data released this week from the U.S. Census Bureau.
But in that same time period, the county grew by only 1,472 people.
The result, according to the 2010 census data, is that now slightly more than 10 percent of the county’s “housing units” — a term that means both houses and apartments — were listed as vacant last year, a number that has likely changed little in the stagnant home market.
In total, census takers found 11,780 vacant “housing units” out of a total of 114,849 homes in all of St. Joseph County.
That number means more than one out of every 10 houses in St. Joseph County is unoccupied — nearly double the 5.9 percent vacancy rate recorded during the 2000 census.
Those vacant houses — the term applies to abandoned houses, houses for sale and unoccupied apartments — are spread throughout the county, in almost every neighborhood.
In the city of South Bend, census takers found 14 percent of houses unoccupied, but that number varied widely, with 4 percent vacant in the Sunnymede neighborhood, to as high as 37 percent vacant on the city’s near northwest side.
In Mishawaka, vacant units made up 11.3 percent of the city’s housing stock.
In St. Joseph County, the vacancy rate varied widely — with census tracts showing as little as 2 percent vacancy in the far northeast corner of the county, to as much as 18 percent vacancy in the neighborhoods along Indiana 23, south of the Toll Road.
Of the 11,780 vacancies, nearly 4,300 were unoccupied rental units, both apartments and houses, and almost 2,100 were houses listed for sale. Less than one percent of the county’s homes were listed as being seasonal or second homes, which are also counted as vacant.
More than 4,000 houses were listed as simply vacant for other reasons — meaning they were likely abandoned or the victim of a foreclosure.
All that available living space, said real estate agent Jim Dunfee, is reflected in the current housing market, which is still struggling from the fallout of the 2008 economic recession.
“When we’re looking at the current state of the housing market, we’re seeing that there’s a lot more vacant houses than there used to be,” said Dunfee, of Weichert Realty, Jim Dunfee and Associates.
Dunfee said there are no local statistics on the total number of foreclosed houses, so it’s been hard to fully assess the local market. But local listings remain high with very few buyers.
“It’s directly tied, from our perspective, to the economic crash,” Dunfee said, “and the fact that people were buying houses when credit was too liberal.”
That liberal credit allowed people to buy houses that many couldn’t afford. Houses, Dunfee said, that many people walked away from when the economy got tough.
“It’s been alarming in the industry to see how many people gave up on their loan,” Dunfee said.
Although Dunfee said he initially believed problems in the housing market would be fixed quickly, he’s no longer optimistic. After three years of sluggish sales, he said, it’s clear the housing problems extend beyond the glut of housing options.
With so many vacant homes for sale, current homeowners have watched their own home values plummet — on average between 18 and 20 percent — bringing prices down to levels similar to the year 2000, Dunfee said.
While that’s good news for buyers, it’s bad news for people looking to sell homes.