American Housing Survey to Adopt New Data Collection Model

Due to rising field costs and declining response rates, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is shifting to a continuous data collection model for the American Housing Survey (AHS), moving away from the previous periodic collection every other year that lasted 5 months. This continuous model will be more effective because it eliminates the costly and time-consuming ramp-up costs associated with the AHS every 2 years. Additionally, it allows for a more experienced AHS workforce to maintain a consistent workload.

An important benefit of this new approach is that HUD will be able to increase the frequency of national and metropolitan AHS estimates. This change will provide more up-to-date estimates and enhance comparability with other annual data sources, such as the American Community Survey and homeownership and vacancy rates.

Data collection was initially planned to begin May 1, 2025, but now will be delayed until January 2026 or later.