WASHINGTON, DC – Finding an affordable place to live can be tremendously difficult for low-Income families.
According to research from the Brookings Institution, poor families in at least ten metro areas they surveyed shell out more than 60% of their income on housing.
The Department of Housing defines households spending more than 30% on housing as “cost-burdened.”
“Even outside of major cities, low-income families and sort of lower middle-income families are finding it harder to cover housing costs as well,” said Jenny Schuetz, an urban economist studying housing policy at Brookings. She says coastal cities like San Francisco get a lot of attention because it’s expensive to build new housing there but people in places like Louisville where the median home value is $158,000 face unique challenges.
“It’s really not a problem that Louisville is too expensive but that there is a mismatch between incomes and the cost of housing at the bottom end of the income distribution. It’s a place where housing costs for middle-income households are still pretty reasonable but there are a number of low-income households who have a difficult time affording decent quality housing in a neighborhood that has the amenities that are close to their jobs,” she added.
Schuetz also found that lower-income households in smaller cities are more likely to live in homes that are 50 years old or older, meaning families that are already stretched are spending more on maintenance or living in poorer quality housing. She says Congress should update the current housing voucher program
“We could actually use our current subsidies more efficiently. At the moment, the way the voucher program works, if you get a voucher, then the housing authority pays for everything, the cost of your rent over 30% of your income. So in effect, we are giving a very large dollar subsidy to a relative smaller number of families,” she explained.
“You could keep the cost of the program the same and just give smaller subsidies to a larger number of families. A lot of people in places like Louisville, the difference between what they are paying in rent and what they can really afford is maybe $100 to $150 a month.”