Trump says U.S. to ban large investors from buying homes

President Donald Trump said the U.S. should bar large institutional investors from buying single-family homes, arguing that corporate ownership has helped push housing further out of reach for everyday Americans.

“For a very long time, buying and owning a home was considered the pinnacle of the American Dream. It was the reward for working hard, and doing the right thing, but now, because of the Record High Inflation caused by Joe Biden and the Democrats in Congress, that American Dream is increasingly out of reach for far too many people, especially younger Americans,” Trump said in a Truth Social post Wednesday.

“It is for that reason, and much more, that I am immediately taking steps to ban large institutional investors from buying more single-family homes, and I will be calling on Congress to codify it. People live in homes, not corporations,” he added.

Private equity giants, real estate investment trusts and other large institutional investors have amassed sizable portfolios of single-family rental homes over the past decade. Many have argued that these investments have reduced housing supply for would-be homeowners and helped drive up prices.

Invitation Homes, which is the largest renter of single-family homes in the country, tumbled 6%. Shares of Blackstone, an investing firm that owns and rents single-family homes, dropped more than 5%. Private equity firm Apollo Global Management also declined over 5%.

The national median existing single-family home price was $426,800 in the third quarter of 2025 after hitting a record high of $435,300 in the summer, according to the National Association of Realtors. The average rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage is currently at 6.19%, according to Mortgage News Daily.

Blackstone was the largest private-equity owner of apartments in the U.S. with more than 230,000 units, according to data from the Private Equity Stakeholder Project released last year. Blackstone in recent years has spent billions acquiring real estate companies such as Tricon Residential, American Campus Communities and AIR Communities.

Trump did not provide details on how such a ban would be implemented. Trump said he plans to outline additional housing and affordability proposals during a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos in two weeks.

Senator Tim Scott, head of the committee overseeing housing in the Senate, said while he embraced Trump’s push for affordability, the better way to go forward would be his bipartisan “ROAD to Housing” bill.

“2026 must be the year we get housing affordability right for working families. I welcome President Trump’s desire to look for ways to create more homeowners, especially first-time homeowners,” Scott said in a statement to CNBC’s Emily Wilkins. “My focus is on advancing meaningful solutions that expand housing supply and lower costs — including building on our unanimously passed ROAD to Housing Act — because that’s how we make the American Dream more attainable.”

— CNBC’s Alex Harring contributed reporting.