Housing Affordability Up as Incomes Rise and Builders Shift Gears

A recent piece originally posted by Phoenix Business Journal, cites home builder’s lack of confidence in move-up buyers as strong motivation behind the latest construction movement toward ‘affordable’ housing. Builders are noticing that more young families and first-time home buyers are expressing an interest in purchasing New Construction homes.

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The trend in residential construction is moving toward building more entry-level homes. One builder anticipates that over 50% of his company’s new construction homes will be standard or mass produced with less customization, resulting in a more efficient process with regard to labor and materials. In this way, builders can better meet the needs of a growing number of first-time home buyers and young families.

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Resale home prices in the Valley are up 6% year over year, an average annual increase, keeping Phoenix area real estate reasonably priced as compared to other U.S. metro regions. Outlying Valley cities and town offer still more reasonable home prices.

NAHB: Report Growing Affordability as Incomes Inch Up

The most affordable housing market in the country is the Youngstown-Warren-Boardman, Ohio major metropolitan area, where more than 92 percent of all homes sold in the first quarter of 2017 were affordable to those earning the area’s median income, according to the recently released National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index (HOI). At the national level, over 60 percent of homes sold were affordable to those earning the nation’s median income—an increase from the fourth quarter of 2016.

“Ongoing job growth continues to fuel demand for housing, while wage growth is helping to offset the effects of rising mortgage rates and keep home prices affordable,” said Robert Dietz, chief economist at the NAHB, in a statement on the Index. “NAHB anticipates that housing will continue on a gradual, upward path throughout the year.”

Outside of major metropolitan areas, the most affordable housing market in the country is Kokomo, Ind., according to the Index. More than 96 percent of homes sold in the first quarter were affordable to those earning the area’s median income.

Other affordable major metropolitan markets include Elgin, Ill., Scranton-Wilkes Barre-Hazleton, Pa., Buffalo-Cheektowaga-Niagara-Falls, N.Y., and Syracuse, N.Y. Other affordable markets outside of metropolitan areas include Glen Falls, N.Y., East Stroudsburg, Pa., Binghamton, N.Y., and Lansing-East Lansing, Mich.

On the other end of the spectrum, the San Francisco-Redwood City-South San Francisco, Calif. major metropolitan area is the least affordable housing market, where approximately 11 percent of homes sold in the first quarter were affordable to those earning the area’s median income.