Area suffers housing shortage near job centers

WASHINGTON - The Washington region has a shortage of housing close to where jobs are located. Housing that is there is unaffordable to people making 60 percent to 100 percent of the area's median income of $102,700 for a family of four.

The Urban Land Institute (ULI) Terwilliger Center for Workforce Housing looked at housing within a 30-minute commute to D.C., Reston/Herndon, Alexandria/Crystal City/Pentagon City, Tysons Corner, Bethesda and Rockville.

The region is short about 40,000 affordable units near these employment areas, the Priced Out report finds.

Almost half the homes in the region are priced at more than $400,000 -- well outside the affordable range for about 23 percent of the metro area's two million households. Those households encompass many professions, including public service, professional, scientific or technical services, health care and social services, construction, retail, administrative support, finance and insurance services and education.

The report says problem is most severe among "family households" -- those with at least three people living together. Households with three or more people living together make up 40 percent of the workforce.

While there is more rental housing near job centers, the rents people can afford are not high enough to support new high-rise or mid-rise construction. Because of that, the report says high-quality rental housing for working families will continue to decline.

"In high-cost markets, workers are being pushed far away from employment centers in search of housing they can afford, and which adequately meets the needs of their families. This is adding to traffic congestion and sprawl, cutting into family time, and straining the economic and environmental well-being of our urban areas," says ULI Chairman J. Ronald Terwillliger, chairman and chief executive officer of Trammell Crow Residential.

The report concludes that the problem will worsen as the economy improves.

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