Foreigners are snapping up US homes and stealing the American dream out from under families

President Donald Trump is pushing hard for Congress to ban Wall Street firms from buying single-family homes. He’s rightly worried that financial tycoons are crowding out younger and middle-class homebuyers, especially in fast-growing Southern cities. But there’s another kind of homebuyer the president and Congress should cut off at the pass: foreigners who are blocking our own citizens from the American Dream.

In a new paper, I show that foreign homebuyers are far more common than most people realize. Between April 2024 and March 2025 alone, foreigners purchased more than 78,000 American homes.  And foreign homebuying is becoming more common with every passing year. Between 2024 and 2025 alone, foreign buyers spent 33% more on U.S. homes than they did in the previous year.

Each home bought by someone from outside the U.S. leaves one fewer home for Americans to buy. That fact alone raises prices for first-time homebuyers — it’s Economics 101. But the situation is even worse when you account for the fact that nearly half of foreigners paid all cash. Younger Americans and middle-class families simply can’t compete with all-cash offers — certainly not if they’re buying their first home. The playing field is tilted against them, and it’s tilted in favor of people who may have never set foot in America at all.

But who, exactly, are these foreign homebuyers?

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Shockingly, a huge number of them are from economic and strategic rival nations. The most foreign homebuyers come from communist China. They purchase about one out of every six foreign-bought homes, and in 2025 alone, they dropped $13.7 billion on American homes.

Tellingly, nearly half of these Chinese buyers intend to use their new home as a way to gain permanent residence in the United States, giving them preferential access to things like a college education for their children. In other words, not only are Chinese citizens crowding Americans out of homes — they’re pushing Americans out of other U.S. institutions, as well.

Whether they’re from China or anywhere else, it’s important to note that these foreigners aren’t simply buying condos or townhomes. They’re overwhelmingly buying the single-family detached homes that Americans want most. Nearly two out of every three foreign home purchases are in that category. So foreign homebuyers are dimming the heart of the American Dream itself.

No matter where they’re from or what kind of home they get, foreign homebuyers are standing in the way of American citizens. But other countries don’t make this mistake. They’ve enacted heavy restrictions on foreign homebuyers precisely because they want to put their own people first.

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Canada is a case in point. While Canadian citizens are some of the most common buyers of American property, their own country bans most foreign purchases of homes. Many foreign purchases that are still allowed are hit with heavy taxes in order to deter them.

Similarly, China severely limits foreign homebuying, even as many of its citizens buy homes in America. The double standard is clear — and so is the harm to America’s people and interests. Our citizens are waiting in line behind homebuyers from our country’s top strategic and economic rival. In what world does that make sense?

The problem is obvious — but so is the solution. Congress should restrict foreigners from buying American homes, either with an outright ban or heavy taxes that discourage purchases. The Republican Study Committee has already laid out a plan to significantly raise taxes on homebuyers from overseas. Such innovative ideas deserve attention and action in the coming months.

This isn’t a matter of sticking it to foreigners. It’s about standing up for our own citizens. The American Dream is for the American people, and young professionals and middle-class families urgently need it brought within their reach.