The US housing market continued its wild streak despite the COVID-19 pandemic and associated shutdowns, with CoreLogic's National Home Price Index rising an impressive 9.2% year-over-year.  And according to new research from Pretium, the SFR market will continue thriving for the foreseeable future, with mortgage credit becoming an attractive, and viable,  fixed income strategy for investors.

SFR and mortgage credit have always been attractive yield alternatives, the Pretium report notes, especially since they've had less crowding than competitors. But analysts say 2021 will be a banner year for the asset classes–particularly "in a fixed income environment where low policy rates, quantitative easing, and now 'Corporate QE' have extracted much of the yields available from liquid securities."

The SFR market has been an investor darling throughout the pandemic, and rents within the segment have consistently logged year-over-year increases. Single-family rents increased 3.8% year over year in January 2021, an uptick from the 2.9% rate recorded for January 2020, according to the CoreLogic Single-Family Rent Index, and are tending to follow a "K-shaped" recovery as the pandemic continues, providing good opportunity for investors.