The latest US Home Affordability Report published by ATTOM has determined owning a median-priced home in the second quarter was less affordable than historical averages in 99.3% of the counties (575 out of 579) with sufficient data to analyze. This is up slightly from the 96.9% share of counties in the first quarter.
The median home price increased to $369,000 in the second quarter from $350,275 in the first quarter. ATTOM’s analysis showed that major expenses for a median-priced home would have consumed 33.7% of the average American’s annual income in the second quarter, up slightly from 32% in the first quarter and above the 28% share typically recommended by lenders. During the second quarter, home expenses the 28% level in 77.9% (451) of the 579 counties analyzed for the new report.
The second quarter marked the 14th consecutive quarter where purchasing and maintaining a median-priced home has required a higher percentage of the typical owner’s wages than has historically been necessary. California had 16 of the 25 counties where affordable homeownership requires the highest annual income, most notably in San Mateo County ($408,819), Santa Clara County ($402,439), and Marin County ($399,647).
“The squeeze is really on for would-be buyers as we go into the summer, which is usually when the housing market is most active,” said Rob Barber, CEO of ATTOM. “Prices just continue to rise and there’s been no relief on mortgage rates. Meanwhile, typical wages are barely increasing from quarter-to-quarter.”
Yes, this article (last sentence) states an obvious problem.
Wages and salaries are NOT keeping up with cost of living, including housing costs.
Wages need to be indexed to small areas so that people living in those micro areas can be paid wages that keep up with the local cost of living.
Just to jiggle a few brain cells, I want to point out other obvious problems and why housing and most everything else is getting more expensive.
The economic policies of this country favor the very rich and those who had a leg up in some fashion or those who “got in earlier” before prices rose so high. Those who are younger and/or come from backgrounds with disadvantaged situations have a very hard time getting a toe hold into the housing market. Our economic policies resist helping and even damage those who are in the lower income ranges.
But the core problem is that there are so many people in the U.S. now.
We are at 347 million and still slowly rising higher.
The easier places to live are filled up, and the remaining areas, while more affordable, are often still expensive compared to the wages in those “other areas”. Some areas (like deserts) require more expense to bring in water. Steep areas (hills, mountains) also cost more to build within.
High populations will always mean more competition for housing, and, thus, home prices rise. Many states where people fled to find more affordable housing are now seeing very high home prices, often out of reach for younger people or lower income people.
People think that the U.S. has a lot of open spaces to build more homes, but most of the U.S. is under some kind of human usage, including for agriculture, grazing, resource extraction, recreational areas and for the few protected natural habitat areas which are crucial for basic functioning of the biosphere.
Imagine IF we planned a future for our nation with only half the current population, or even less than that.
This could be a scenario that we choose for the future (do NOT listen to Elon Musk).
A LESS densely populated nation would mean less demand for housing (falling home prices). Water would be cheaper and more available and at lower costs with each passing decade. Just think about how nice it would be to have less crowding, less traffic, cheaper foods, farm lands closer to the shrinking cities, more parks and wild areas to enjoy near where you live, and more access to free wild resources.
The world now has 8.2 Billion people (16x more humans than 400 years ago), and the global population is projected to peak at a whopping 10.3 Billion by year 2084.
This is because birth rates globally are slowing down and will be at net 0 growth in year 2084 when births that year will equal deaths that year. After that, the population will do a very very very slow decline but still will be at a staggeringly high 10.2 Billion in year 2100, meaning 2 Billion more humans than today.
NOTHING IS GOING TO GET CHEAPER with that scenario.
Housing is competing with other land uses in our over-crowded world.
The U.S. needs lands and waters to produce for our own citizens, and the U.S. also exports tons of products to other nations, so our resource extraction and production has huge impacts on U.S. lands and waters, even if American consumers are not using those products.
Thus, global over-population and rising consumerism in other nations is propelling more demands to convert wild lands into human use lands for many uses, including resource extraction. In California, the huge almond acreages suck up tons of lands and waters, but 82% of the almonds are sold to Asia. Cattle production in the U.S. is often destined for foreign consumers.
Never Ending Growth is the Mantra of the Cancer Cell, and, if not stopped and reduced,
it sickens and kills its host. Humans are the cancer of the biosphere because we are grossly over-populate. Rising consumerism for modern living standards uses far more resources per person than how people lived just 100 years ago. All that means huge impacts to lands and waters and resources and higher prices due to hyper competition.
The U.S. is the highest consumer nation on earth, using 25% of global resources (that are used by humans).
Thus, our 347 million may not sound like much, but we consume like an average nation of over 2 Billion people, more than India, China, and all of Africa.
So when we point to other nations as over-populated, you have to factor in consumer usage too.
I’d love to see a world of under 1 Billion humans, hopefully 500 million (1/2 Billion max),
and that would mean that nature could be restored and provide vast resources for free (just some labor needed). Housing and most other costs would fall. People would be less stressed out and would not have to work so many hours.
Just give that some thought when you hear Musk blathering lies that the world population is falling. NO report shows that. But, birth rates have been slowing down since the mid 1960’s, but the population has risen so high. In 1960, the world had 3 Billion humans, by 2037, there will be 9 Billion, simply because birth rates each year are still higher than deaths each year, so more people are added. This year, nearly 70 million people will be added to the world population, and that equals adding the population of California and Texas in one single year, and that is a huge impact on the planet and more competition for all resources.
Smell the over-population, read about it, and ignore Elon Musk on this topic.
He is over-populating the earth on his own, yet he fears the impacts of his own actions by clamoring to move to Mars, so let’s help him and his hoard of wives and kids to move to Mars and unload that turkey. Musk also knows that with his vast fortune and family compounds, he can do just fine in an over-populated world during his lifetime, but the rest of us and future generations will suffer.
Remember that WARS are rooted in fears of who will control shrinking resources in an over-populated world. Choose to have only 1 child per adult max or even 1 child per couple or no children at all, and adopt the rest. The world and future generations will benefit by those of us living know educating ourselves about our over-population impacts and how we can change that course in humane and fair ways.