According to Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, over 11 million renters with minimum wage incomes of $19,000 competed for 6.9 million affordable apartments in 2011. Renters with annual incomes of $15,000 must find a unit for $375 a month for it to be affordable. The center considers housing to be affordable if it costs 30 percent or less of household income. During the four years from 2007 to 2011, Harvard researchers found 3.3 million people became renters, although only 225,000 additional people obtained housing assistance. As MHProNews has learned, rent increases have grown faster than incomes, and as more Americans turn away from homeownership to renting, the competition for rental units increases and so do the rents. Of the nation’s housing stock, the number of rentals rose from 31 percent in 2004 to 35 percent in 2012, while vacancy rates fell from 10.6 percent in 2009 to 8.5 percent in 2013, according to app.com.
