From Dow Jones & Company:

The number of renters in America spending more than 30% of their incomes on rent and utilities hit a record high of 22.4 million, according to a report by the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University. Even higher-income households are experiencing increased strain with rent increases, continuing after rising nearly 20% between 2021 and 2022. Wages have not kept pace with rising rental costs, with lower-income renters making less than $30,000 a year affected the most. Evictions and homelessness are also on the rise, reaching the highest level on record, according to the report. After pandemic-era policies, the housing safety net is overwhelmed and underfunded. Half of U.S. renters in 2022 were spending more than 30% of their incomes on rent and utilities, up 3.2 percentage points from before the pandemic in 2019. Among these renters, an all-time high of 12.1 million were severely “cost burdened,” the group said, spending more than half of their incomes on housing. Inflation, cost burden, homeless are all rising. This is a major national crisis.



Read more: Record share of renters now spend too much of their income on housing, study finds