Housing Finance Working Paper Series

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This paper examines the single-family rental mortgages purchased by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two major Government-Sponsored Enterprises (GSEs) in the conventional secondary mortgage market. These properties are the "mom and pop shops" of the rental market, meaning they are small and largely individually owned and managed. To date there has been little research on this segment of the rental market. This analysis looks at neighborhood, avertibility, borrower, and financial characteristics of the GSEs' mortgage purchases. The study finds that while single-family rental properties are a small portion of the GSEs' overall business, they are a large and important segment of the rental stock for lower income families.