Housing Costs Eat Up Family Budgets — But So Does Vast Inequality

American Communities Project

Across the country, communities of all sizes are struggling with affordable housing shortages, which have increased dramatically over the past 40 to 50 years. The situation is especially bad in urban areas. In the nation’s 500 largest cities, 37% of households pay more than 30% of their household income on rent, compared to 25.3% on average nationally.

Looking at the distribution of excessive housing cost across cities with populations of 66,000 or more, a clear pattern emerges. Coastal cities tend to have higher than average rates of excessive housing costs than those in the middle of the country.