Families earning the nation’s median annual income of $97,800 needed to pay 38% of their monthly salaries to cover the mortgage payments on median-priced homes in the fourth quarter of 2024, according to findings by the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) and Wells Fargo.

Low-income families, defined as those earning only 50% of the median income, would have to spend 76% of their earnings to pay for the same new home. These results come from the latest cost of housing index (CHI) produced by the NAHB and Wells Fargo and speak to the affordability challenges facing U.S. families.

The data from the report changed slightly between the third and fourth quarters of last year, with affordability declining for low-income families, who in the fourth quarter had to spend 1% more of their salaries to afford home payments.

NAHB Chairman Carl Harris said the CHI should serve as a wake-up call for policymakers on the need to enact policies that get at the core of the nation’s housing affordability crisis by eliminating barriers preventing builders from increasing the supply of new homes and apartments.

“NAHB’s 10-point housing plan outlines key actions that officials at all levels of government can take to achieve concrete results to lower construction costs and boost housing production,” Harris said in a statement. “These include eliminating burdensome regulations, addressing inefficient building material supply chains and overturning inefficient local zoning rules.”

In the 176 U.S. markets surveyed in the fourth quarter index, the typical family had to pay 50% or more of their income on a median-priced existing home in 10 markets. The most expensive market was the San Jose area, where 87% of the typical family’s income was needed to make a mortgage payment, followed by Honolulu (74%), San Diego (69%), San Francisco (69%) and Naples, Florida, (65%).

The survey also found that families needed to spend between 31% and 50% of their total incomes in 85 markets, and families spent 30% or less of their total incomes in 81 markets.

The least cost-burdened markets in the survey were Decatur, Illinois, where the typical family needed to spend 16% of their income to pay for a mortgage. Other less cost-burdened communities were Cumberland, Maryland-West Virginia, (17%); Springfield, Illinois, (17%); Elmira, New York, (19%); and Peoria, Illinois, (19%).