The National Association of Home Builders released last month their Housing Opportunity Index covering the most and least affordable cities in the country. Here’s a quick rundown of the top 10 metropolitan areas with a population over 500,000.
Ten Least Affordable Cities
1. New York-White Plains-Wayne, NY-NJ
2. San Francisco-San mateo-Redwood City, CA
3. Nassau-Suffolk, NY
4. Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale, CA
5. Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall, FL
6. Santa Ana-Anaheim-Irvine, CA
7. El Paso, TX
8. Newark-Union, NJ-PA
9. Honolulu, HI
10. Seattle-Bellevue-Everett, WA
Ten Most Affordable CitiesW
1. Indianapolis-Carmel, IN
2. Warren-Troy-Farmington Hills, MI
3. Youngstown-Warren-Boardman, OH-PA
4. Detroit-Livonia-Dearborn, MI
5. Grand Rapids-Wyoming, MI
6. Syracuse, NY
7. Dayton, OH
8. Akron, OH
9. Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, OH
10. Scranton-Wilkes-Barre, PA
No one wants to live in these cities, that’s why they are so “affordable”. There’s more to a city than having cheap rent but if the big city isn’t your thing, you may be more interested in checking into the most and least affordable cities under 500,000:
Ten Least Affordable Cities with a Population Under 500,000
1. San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles, CA
2. Ocean City, NJ
3. Santa Cruz-Watsonville, CA
4. Napa, CA
5. Flagstaff, AZ
6. Medford, OR
7. Bend, OR
8. Mount Vernon-Anacortes, WA
9. St. George, UT
10. Laredo, TX
So I’ve lived in SLO and even at the time I can see the rents going up, but this is primarily because the city refuses to build out to accomodate the increasing demand of the University there. 10 years ago, the city was about 55,000 population, of that 36,000 were college students and the rest were bartenders or retired folks.
Ten Most Affordable Cities with a Population Under 500,000
1. Lansing-East Lansing, MI
2. Sandusky, OH
3. Lima, OH
4. Springfield, OH
5. Bay City, MI
6. Battle Creek, MI
7. Canton-Massillon, OH
8. Saginaw-Saginaw Township North, MI
9. Utica-Rome, NY
10. Binghamton, NY