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Affordable rentals for low-income individuals are getting harder to come by in Phoenix. Rents have been on a swift upward trajectory since 2012. Now in 2019, Arizona’s affordable housing shortage is the 3rd most severe in the U.S., according to a new report.
Listen to this KJZZ segment below produced by Cronkite News. The report that it details was compiled by the National Low Income Housing Coalition.
The Cronkite News report cites many factors that exacerbate our current affordable housing shortage, including:
- 200+ new residents each day moving to Maricopa County
- land speculation in the run-up to the Great Recession
- half of all jobs in Arizona pay less than $15/hour
- suburban sprawl
- rapidly increasing demand for housing
If you’ve noticed construction cranes all over Phoenix, you are watching an apartment boom in real-time. According to this article in The Arizona Republic by Catherine Reagor, over 16,000 apartments are coming online. They have been under construction in 2018 and 2019. However, most are luxury apartments charging over $1,000/month that don’t address the shortage of affordable rentals.
If I can’t afford a house, or afford to keep it, I don’t want to have it.
– Jim Nabors, American actor who portrayed the Gomer Pyle character
