Nearly three-quarters of homeowners see affordability challenges in NAHB survey

Almost three out of four households in the United States said they think there is a housing affordability crisis in the nation, according to a recent poll by the National Association of Home Builders. A majority of respondents also said they have witnessed this problem in their state or community.

Home prices have been increasing steadily for several years. According to the latest existing home sales report from the National Association of Realtors, prices have gone up on an annual basis for 80 consecutive months. The median existing home price in October was $255,400.

The National Association of Realtors has typically said that a low inventory of homes for sale has helped drive up competition and prices, although the number of available listings has increased in recent months – particularly in more expensive markets. However, higher mortgage interest rates have also helped to reduce the buying power of those looking to purchase a home.

In the NAHB survey, which collected 2,203 responses at the end of November, 73 percent of households said they believe that a lack of affordable housing is a problem in the U.S. Sixty-eight percent said this issue is a problem in their state, and 54 percent say affordability concerns are noticeable in their neighborhood.

Fifty-eight percent of respondents said they would have trouble finding a home they could afford in their community or county if they decided to purchase one in the near future.

"These poll results confirm what builders from across the nation have been warning about – that housing affordability is an increasingly serious problem in communities across America," said Randy Noel, NAHB chairman and a custom home builder from LaPlace, La. "A mix of regulatory barriers, ill-considered public policy, and challenging market conditions is driving up costs and making it increasingly difficult for buyers to produce homes that are affordable to low- and moderate-income families."

Residents in urban areas were most likely to report affordability concerns, with 68 percent of city dwellers saying there was a lack of affordable housing. Sixty-four percent of respondents in middle-class neighborhoods and 56 percent of those in rural areas said the same.

In its Housing Trends Report, previously released in the summer of 2018, NAHB also identified affordability concerns among prospective buyers. Of the 11,674 respondents who said they expected to buy a home within the next 12 months, 83 percent said they could afford less than half of the homes for sale in their target market.

NAHB said builders face several hurdles of their own that make it difficult to construct more low- and moderate-priced homes. These include higher costs for construction materials, a shortage of skilled workers, a constricted supply of developed lots, and policies that restrict what types of homes can be built in certain areas. The organization also said that regulatory requirements account for about one-quarter of the price of a single-family home and 30 percent of the cost of a multifamily dwelling.

"Housing is vital to the economic health of our nation," said Noel. "This poll should serve as a wake-up call to policymakers at all levels of government to ease regulatory burdens that needlessly drive up the cost of housing and to enact policies that will encourage the production of badly needed affordable housing units."