Housing Landscape 2012 – Annual Look at Housing Affordability Challenges of America's Working Households

Housing Landscape 2012 – An Annual Look at the Housing Affordability Challenges of America’s Working Households by Laura Williams, February 2012

  • “This report focuses on housing affordability for working households. For the purposes of this report, working households are those that worked at least 20 hours per week, on average, and had a household income of no more than 120 percent of the median income in their area. There were approximately 45.1 million working households in the United States in 2010, almost evenly split between homeowners (22.6 million) and renters (22.5 million). In 2010, approximately one-third of all owner-occupied households met the working household definition; this group typically earned between 50 percent and 120 percent of the area median income (AMI). Nationally, the median income for working household owners in 2010 was a little higher than $41,000 — or about 80 percent of the median income for all U.S. homeowners. Due to their lower incomes, working household owners faced greater affordability challenges than higher-income homeowners. On the other hand, working renters represent a majority of all renters; almost 60 percent of all renter-occupied households met the working household definition in 2010. Overall, renting households saw their incomes decrease and housing costs increase, creating greater affordability challenges than in previous years.”
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