The American dream now comes with a ZIP code: Here's where starter homes are still within reach
For many would-be homeowners, the financial hurdle to buying a starter home has grown dramatically over the past seven years. The income needed to afford a typical starter home has...
By Fox News · Fox News
For many would-be homeowners, the financial hurdle to buying a starter home has grown dramatically over the past seven years. The income needed to afford a typical starter home has jumped more than 80% since 2019, according to a new Realtor.com report . Americans now need an annual household income of about $78,000 to afford a typical starter home, up from roughly $43,000 in 2019—an increase that has far outpaced wage growth and left many first-time buyers struggling to break into the housing market. "First-time buyers aren't sitting on the sidelines because they don't want to own a home—it's because, for many of them, it's just not possible right now," Hannah Jones, senior economist at Realtor.com, told Fox News Digital. THINK YOUR STATE IS EXPENSIVE? NEW DATA REVEALS WHERE AMERICANS FACE THE HIGHEST COST-OF-LIVING The analysis paints a mixed picture for first-time buyers. While the supply of starter homes has slowly improved since bottoming out during the pandemic housing crunch, elevated mortgage rates, higher home prices and a lingering shortage of affordable listings continue to keep many aspiring homeowners on the sidelines. The recovery has also been uneven, creating sharply different conditions depending on where Americans are looking to buy. A wave of new construction has helped fuel the strongest recovery in starter-home inventory across the South and West, according to Jones, while buyers in much of the Northeast continue to face rising prices and limited supply. Builders in those regions have increasingly focused on smaller homes and lots, she said, helping expand the supply of entry-level housing and better match what first-time buyers are looking for. The South has experienced the strongest turnaround of any region , adding nearly 170,000 affordable listings since the market bottomed out in 2022. Starter-home prices there have also declined 3.5% from their pandemic peak. "Buyers in parts of the South and West are seeing more homes in their price range…