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SAN DIEGO—Comparing supply data from three different sources reveals disparities in the number of multifamily units in the US housing stock, Norm Miller and Michael Dinn tell GlobeSt.com. Miller is Hahn Chair of Real Estate Finance at the University of San Diego, affiliated with the Burnham-Moores Center for Real Estate, and is a principal at Homer Hoyt Advisory Services; Dinn is president of Dinn Focused Marketing Inc. We spoke to them exclusively about why government estimates of the stock may be so far off.

GlobeSt.com: What have you noticed about the multifamily-housing-stock numbers?

Miller and Dinn: In recent studies on the multifamily market, we had the opportunity to compare 2016 supply data from three sources, including the US Census ACS numbers adjusted for reported construction permits, a variety of well-known commercial real estate services companies and CoStar. The CRE services companies had, on average, just a slightly higher estimate of the stock by metro than the US Census, but both were significantly below the CoStar estimates. Focusing only on the rental stock in buildings with five or more units, and for the nation as a whole, the CoStar data base had 3,897,961 more rental units than the Census, or 17.2% more units in total. When compared for 50 selected metros, the result was 16.2% more units in total, suggesting that a disproportionate number of units that are missing from government estimates are from smaller cities and rural areas.