ST. LOUIS–A new survey finds Americans saying inflation has had a bigger impact on their finances than COVID-19, although the pandemic has exacerbated inflation.
Three-fourths of Americans (73%) say inflation has impacted their plans to buy a home, compared to just 23% who cited COVID-19, according to a survey from Real Estate Witch.
“According to our research, 54% of Americans consider the pandemic ongoing. The remaining 46% argue that the COVID-19 pandemic is over because, in large part, our daily lives are back to ‘normal’,” Real Estate Witch stated. “The U.S., however, is still averaging around 40,000 new cases of COVID-19 a day.”
Seeking to answer how Americans are balancing rising expenses and the constant concern over another pandemic, Real Estate Witch said it surveyed 1,000 people to learn more about their finances, their debt, their emergency savings, and if they’ve recovered from financial setbacks as a result of the pandemic.
The Findings
Among the findings:
- 70% of Americans say recent levels of inflation has impacted their finances more than the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Renters (32%) are 10% more likely than homeowners (29%) to say they are financially worse off than before the pandemic.
- 16% of Americans believe their finances will never recover from the pandemic.
- Americans are 60% more pessimistic about the housing market than they were a year ago.
- Only 28% say now is a good time to buy a home, compared to 44% in March 2022 and 69% in April 2021.
- Only one-third of Americans (33%) believe they can pay off their debt within a year, and 6% believe they will never be able to pay off their debt.
- Three years later, 72% of Americans still have not recovered financially from the COVID-19 pandemic.
- 75% of Americans have non-mortgage debt, and of those, 73% are stressed about their current financial situation.
- 73% of Americans have lived paycheck to paycheck at some point during the pandemic, including 44% who are currently living paycheck to paycheck.
- More than 1 in 4 Americans (27%) have skipped meals, and 22% skipped medical appointments or treatments to save money.
- 82% of Americans support the government distributing more stimulus checks.
- Nearly half of Americans (49%) consider the COVID-19 pandemic a leading cause of the historic inflation we’re experiencing.
- 45% of Americans have no emergency savings at all, and 38% believe they will run out of savings in 2023.
- Although 24% of Americans say they’re more stressed about pandemic-related issues than they were last year, 45% say they are less stressed.
The full report can be found here.