The American Dream of homeownership is far from becoming a reality for many U.S. residents making less than $75,000 annually, a recent study found.
As of March, U.S. households earning $75,000 to $100,000 a year can only afford 21.2% of home listings, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). That’s up from 20.8% the prior year but is still a far cry from the 48.8% mark seen in March 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic changed the affordability landscape.
“For many first-time homebuyers, navigating the current housing market still feels like window shopping,” said Nadia Evangelou, NAR senior economist and director of real estate research, in a press release. “Listing prices don’t match first-time homebuyers’ budgets. If the promising trend of building smaller homes continues, that could be a meaningful step toward easing the housing affordability gap for more buyers.”
The study found that households need to make at least $125,000 to afford at least half of the homes on the market. But the 51.7% of homes available at that income level is still well below the 74.8% mark from March 2019.
NAR noted that a balanced market would offer households in the $75,000 to $100,000 income bracket access to approximately 48.1% of listings. To achieve that threshold, the housing market would need to add 416,000 homes priced at or below $255,000, the association found.
Looking at housing supply, NAR classified 30% of the top 100 U.S. metropolitan areas as “getting closer to balance.” However, 26% of metros were deemed to be “falling further behind,” with 44% of metro areas “stuck in the middle.”
While nearly a third of metros have gotten closer to a balanced housing market, those gains haven’t been evenly distributed regionally, with the Midwest and South adding the most housing supply.
“Shoppers see more homes for sale today than one year ago, and encouragingly, many of these homes have been added at moderate income price points,” NAR Chief Economist Danielle Hale stated. “But as this report shows, we still don’t have an abundance of homes that are affordable to low- and moderate-income households, and the progress that we’ve seen is not happening everywhere. It’s been concentrated in the Midwest and the South.”
