Homeownership affordability eroded faster in Ohio than anywhere else in the country between 2020 and 2025, according to the National Housing Conference's second annual Priced Out report. Researchers found that the share of occupations able to buy a typically priced home with a 10% down payment fell almost 41% across Ohio metropolitan areas.
Statewide, the report puts the share of occupations that could buy at 10% down at 26% in 2025, down from 67% five years earlier. Renting also tightened: occupations able to afford a two-bedroom apartment slipped from 77% to 69%.
Mansfield recorded Ohio's largest loss. The report says a typical home there cost $115,041 in 2020 with a qualifying income of $28,483; by 2025 the price reached $188,863 and required $62,931, a 121% jump. Mansfield, Cleveland, Springfield, Toledo and Akron were among the 25 steepest declines nationally.
Marcus Roth, a spokesperson for the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing in Ohio, said rising costs are pushing jobs once considered middle class out of ownership and adding pressure to the rental market. NHC President and CEO David M. Dworkin said teachers, firefighters, EMTs and postal workers are increasingly priced out of the communities they serve, describing it as a workforce and economic problem as well as a housing one.
The report says the average annual salary of occupations that lost buying power was $70,283. Separate National Low Income Housing Coalition and COHHIO analyses cited in the article say a full-time Ohio worker needs $23.82 an hour for a modest two-bedroom apartment, and that the state lacks 266,000 affordable and available rental units.