In the Media

A recent analysis by the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard found that giving low-income families $15,000 for a down payment could help almost 1.5 million Black and Hispanic renters buy homes, and substantially reduce the homeownership gap.

Currently, 50.9% of Colorado renter households are “cost burdened,” with housing taking up more than 30% of total household income and 26% of renters are “severely cost-burdened,” with rent occupying more than 50% of household income, according to data from the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University.

Home sales have surged despite higher prices, locking in existing racial disparities and and higher cost burdens, according to a new report from the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies.

Tight future markets are confirmed by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies (JCHS). In their 2021 report, these experts say “the supply of existing homes for sale has never been tighter,” and is at its lowest level since 1982.

“Households that weathered the crisis without financial distress are snapping up the limited supply of homes for sale, pushing up prices and further excluding less affluent buyers from home ownership,” a report from Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies concluded in June.

According to The State of the Nation’s Housing report, released June 16 by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, more than half of all renter households lost employment income between March 2020 and March of this year.

"In the first quarter of this year, we found that about 7 million renter households were behind on rent, and of those about 17% thought that eviction was very likely in the next two months," says JCHS research analyst Riordan Frost. "If the eviction moratorium does expire, that group could be in a dire situation."

“These outsized increases have raised concerns that a home price bubble is emerging,” said Daniel McCue, a senior research associate at the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies. “But conditions today are quite different from the early 2000s, particularly in terms of credit availability. The current climb in prices instead reflects strong demand amid tight supply, aided by record-low interest rates.”

The Harvard report said a looming housing crisis would disproportionately impact people of color and low-income tenants, further dividing the haves from the have-nots as the wealthy are simultaneously fueling a hot housing market and driving home prices up.

New research from Harvard University shows that 2 million homeowners are behind on their mortgages and 6 million renters are behind on their rent payments.