A Pro Family Housing Agenda | Newgeography.com

There
is
considerable
concern
about
housing
affordability
in
the
United
States.
Housing
is
the
most
expensive
element
of
the
cost
of
living,
which
makes
it
an
important
issue
to
both
households
and
governments.
Indeed,
the
high
cost
of
housing
relative
to
income
(i.e.
the
degree
of
affordability)
is
an
existential
threat
to
the
future
of
the
middle-class
in
some
housing
markets
(metropolitan
areas),
and
even
threatens
to
jeopardize
the
demographic
future
of
the
republic.
While
the
housing
situation
has
not
become
a
crisis
everywhere—and
for
older
Americans
remains
relatively
affordable—for
young
Americans,
housing
has
become
crushingly
expensive
in
most
of
the
country,
crippling
their
economic
and
family
futures.

Highlights

1. Americans
   across
   all
   demographic
   groups
   and
   political
   persuasions
   prefer
   single-family
   housing
   to
   apartments.
2. For
   young
   Americans,
   housing
   has
   become
   crushingly
   expensive
   in
   most
   of
   the
   country,
   crippling
   their
   economic
   and
   family
   futures.
3. The
   American
   dream
   of
   owning
   good
   housing
   at
   a
   good
   price
   is
   increasingly
   unobtainable,
   especially
   for
   Americans
   under
   age
   35.

Whereas
in
1969,
the
price
of
a
median
home
cost
about
five
years
of
a
young
adult’s
income,
today
it
costs
nearly
nine
years.
As
we
show
in
a new
Institute
for
Family
Studies report,


Homes
For
Young
Families:
A
Pro-Family
Housing
Agenda, since
1970,
the
share
of
young
adults
who
own
the
home
they
live
in
has declined
from
50%
to
around
25-30
percent.
Moreover,
across
metro
areas,
the
share
of
housing
markets
we
define
as
“Seriously
Unaffordable”
or
worse
(i.e.
median
homes
worth
10
years
or
more
of
a
young
adult’s
income)
rose
from
1%
to
37
percent.
By
far,
these
increases
were
the
most
severe
in
large
coastal
markets,
which
is
why
Americans
are
increasingly
migrating
away
from
these
markets
in
pursuit
of
affordability.

Many
factors
have
conspired
to
worsen
housing
affordability
for
young
adults,
but
two
sets
of
policies
in
particular
have
dramatically
boosted
housing
costs
without
producing
economic
benefits
to
offset
cost:
1)
local
land-use
rules
limiting
housing
supply,
and
2)
urban
growth
boundaries
preventing
greenfield
development.
We
find
that
the
most
unaffordable
housing
is
overwhelmingly
likely
to
have
both
urban
growth
boundaries
and
very
strict
local
land-use
rules.
As
a
result,
it
is
no
exaggeration
to
say
that
the
housing
affordability
crisis
facing
American
young
adults
has
substantially
been
caused
by
bad
urban
and
regional
planning,
and
bad
local
land-use
policies.

Since
the
housing
affordability
crisis
facing
young
adults
is
largely
policy-induced,
we
propose
a
wide
range
of
policy
fixes
for
every
level
of
government,
including:
extremely
local
HOAs;
municipal
zoning
related
to
parking,
ADUs,
renovations,
policing
priorities,
and
lot
size;
state
rules
governing
municipalities
and
educational
programs;
and
federal
housing
programs
and
housing
assistance.
Our
proposals
are
focused
on
ensuring
that
obstacles
to
new
housing
supply
are
removed,
and
especially
on
encouraging
policymakers
to
focus
on
the
regulations
that
substantively
burden
the
transition
into
family
life.

Read
the
rest
of
this
piece
at:

Institute
for
Family
Studies.

Wendell
Cox
is
principal
of

Demographia,
an
international
public
policy
firm
located
in
the
St.
Louis
metropolitan
area.
He
is
a
Senior
Fellow
with
Unleash
Prosperity
in
Washington
and
the

Frontier
Centre
for
Public
Policy
in
Winnipeg
and
a
member
of
the
Advisory
Board
of
the

Center
for
Demographics
and
Policy
at
Chapman
University
in
Orange,
California.
He
has
served
as
a
visiting
professor
at
the

Conservatoire
National
des
Arts
et
Metiers
in
Paris.
His
principal
interests
are
economics,
poverty
alleviation,
demographics,
urban
policy
and
transport.
He
is
author
of
the
annual

Demographia
International
Housing
Affordability
Survey
and
author
of

Demographia
World
Urban
Areas.

Lyman
Stone
is
the
Director
of
the
Pronatalism
Initiative
at
the
Institute
for
Family
Studies.
He
is
also
the
Director
of
Research
for
the
population
consulting
firm
Demographic
Intelligence,
a
Senior
Fellow
at
the
Canadian
think
rank
Cardus,
and
a
PhD
Candidate
at
McGill
University.
His
work
on
demography
and
fertility
has
been
covered
widely
in
most
papers
of
record
in
North
America,
as
well
as
many
in
Europe
and
Asia.

Photo
and
chart
courtesy
of
Institute
for
Family
Studies.

Go to Source
Author: Wendell Cox and Lyman Stone