There were a lot more places to live in Idaho last year than there were the year before, according to a report from the U.S. Census Bureau. There were 685,099 housing units in Idaho in 2014. To the census, a housing unit is most anywhere people live; houses, mobile homes, apartments large or small.
The number of Idaho units went up by more than 6,000 between July 2013 and July 2014. That was the biggest increase the state had seen in several years.
About a quarter of Idaho’s total housing units are in Ada County. The county added 2,982 units last year. That was nearly half of the state's total increase.
Greg Manship runs Intermountain MLS, a company that tracks real estate data in southwest Idaho. He says in Ada County, with houses at least, demand is outpacing supply.
“That’s the reason we’ve seen prices started increasing,” Manship says. “But it’s not a bad thing. In other words we haven’t had huge spikes. It’s just growing at a nice steady pace with regards to how prices are going up.”
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