Report says first responders, teachers struggle to afford homes in metro area, Springs

Finding a home to buy in metro Denver and increasingly even Colorado Springs has gotten much tougher in the past year for teachers, first responders and other service workers, according to a report Friday from Trulia.

Last April, Trulia estimated that 29 percent of the homes listed on the metro Denver market were affordable to someone earning the median wage of a first responder, which the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics listed as $70,790 in 2016.

By 2017, the median wage for first responders in metro Denver had risen to $75,140, a robust 6.1 percent increase.

But the median listing price for homes rose even faster, 11.4 percent, to $529,000 currently, Trulia reports.

Only 18.6 percent of homes listed for sale are now in the reach of someone earning the median wage of a first responder.

“As the number of available homes that service workers can afford in the places they serve dwindles, these occupations will likely have to move further away and endure longer commutes or turn to more affordable renting options, such as renting with roommates,” said Trulia senior economist Cheryl Young.

Metro Denver teachers are in an even tougher spot when it comes to buying a home. They earn a smaller median wage, $54,403, and saw more modest wage gains, 1.9 percent. A year ago, 12.9 percent of the homes listed were affordable to teachers, while only 5.1 percent of homes in April were.

Trulia also looked at restaurant workers, who had the share of homes affordable to them cut in half from 0.4 percent to 0.2 percent.

At a median wage of $22,320, restaurants workers were priced out of metro Denver’s for-sale housing market a long time ago.

Doctors, with a median wage of $208,000 in metro Denver, can afford 86.9 percent of the homes listed, down from 90.7 percent a year ago.

Computer programmers were added in this year’s study and with a median wage of $96,433, they can afford 43.9 percent of the homes listed in April.

The study assumed one wage earner, and having two opens up a larger share of homes to buyers. But even then, a tight inventory has resulted in slim pickings and intense competition in the more affordable end of the market.

Trulia examined affordability for workers in 100 metros, and found Colorado Springs suffered the second worst deterioration of any metro in housing affordability after Tacoma, Wash.

Back in April 2017, first responders could afford 51.4 percent of the homes listed, but this April, only 24.4 percent of the homes remained affordable to them.

Teachers saw the share of homes affordable to them fall from 31.7 percent to just 10 percent.

Driving that decline in affordability in Colorado Springs was a 29.1 percent surge in the median listing price the past year, from $309,000 to $400,000, Trulia said.

Like its neighbors to the north, Colorado Springs is attracting transplants from other parts of the country faster than builders can keep pace. Buyers who can’t afford the Denver market and who are willing to make the commute have relocated there in recent years.

“Spillover from Denver’s hot housing market may have priced-out Denverites flocking to northern Colorado Springs in search of more affordable options, thus driving prices skyward,” Young said.

Higher mortgage rates, which boost monthly payments, have also made homes less affordable in Denver, Colorado Springs and across the country.