Here's how many Americans can't afford housing
According to new research by Harvard University, almost 40 million Americans cannot afford to pay for housing. Homeownership has gone down and rental prices keep going up, meaning that millions of residents are forced to pay way more than they should.
Homeownership keeps declining, according to the Joint Center for Housing Studies' detailed and comprehensive 2017 State of the Nation's Housing report, in part because homes prices in many markets have continued to go up while wages have not kept pace. In 2016, "the homeownership rate fell to 63.4 percent, marking the 12th consecutive year of declines."
A lot of people who would like to buy are stuck renting, Harvard reports: "The surge in rental demand that began in 2005 is broad-based — including several types of households that traditionally prefer homeownership."
At the same time, renting is more expensive, as "rent gains across the country continue to far outpace inflation." And supply is tight. Since most of the new units being built are at the high end, "the number of modestly priced units available for under $800 declined by 261,000 between 2005 and 2015, while the number renting for $2,000 or more jumped by 1.5 million."
Can't buy, can't rent. For a lot of people, especially in the pricey major metro areas where so many of the good jobs are, the situation looks grim. NBC News sums up the findings this way: "Over 38 million American households can't afford their housing, an increase of 146 percent in the past 16 years."
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