Mike Wolanin | The Republic An exterior view of the Villas Apartments in Columbus, Ind., Monday, April 29, 2024.
The housing affordability gap in Bartholomew County grew over the past year, with the hourly salary needed to afford a fair market rate two-bedroom apartment rising 15% while the estimated average hourly wage of local renters fell nearly 2%, according to a new report.
The Low Income Housing Coalition’s “Out of Reach” 2024 report released last week and its 2023 report show that the hourly salary needed to afford a fair market rate two-bedroom apartment in Bartholomew County jumped from $19.96 to $23 from fiscal year 2023 to fiscal year 2024. At the same time, the average hourly wage of local renters slid from $23.37 to $22.92 over the same period.
Statewide, the average hourly wage needed to afford a fair market rate two-bedroom apartment in Indiana was $22.07 in fiscal year 2024, up $3.07 from the previous year. The average Hoosier renter’s hourly wage also ticked up 6 cents to $17.92 over the same period.
However, the housing wage in Bartholomew County and Indiana was still lower than much of the rest of the country. Nationally, the hourly wage needed to afford a fair market rate two-bedroom apartment was $32.11 in fiscal year 2024.
While the rise in the hourly wage needed to afford a fair market rate two-bedroom apartment in Bartholomew County largely tracked with statewide trends, the decline in the average wage of local renters “kind of bucks the trend” in Indiana, where renters, on average, saw their wages slightly tick up, said Andrew Bradley, senior director of policy and strategy at Prosperity Indiana.
Prosperity Indiana is a statewide community economic development network for nonprofit, public and private sector entities. The organization is the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s statewide partner in Indiana.
“What that means is that actually a year ago, Columbus was one of the few places in the state where the average renter wage was a bit higher than the two-bedroom housing wage on average,” Bradley told The Republic. “However, now the housing costs have increased to such a degree that Columbus fits the overall pattern of having a housing wage that is higher than the typical renter’s wage.”
Findings
The coalition’s 2024 report shows that the housing wage is higher than the renter wage in 88 of Indiana’s 92 counties. In addition, less than a third of the state’s top 20 largest occupations pay enough to meet the state’s housing wage.
The Housing Wage is an estimate of the hourly wage that full-time works need to earn to afford a fair market rate two-bedroom rental home without spending more than 30% of their income.
In Bartholomew County, that came out to $47,840 for fiscal year 2024, up from $41,520 the year before, according to the reports.
By comparison, an estimated 28% of households in Bartholomew County — some 9,640 households — had an annual income of less than $35,000 in 2022, according to the most recent Census Bureau estimates.
The reports said rent for a fair market rate two-bedroom apartment in Bartholomew County in fiscal year 2024 was $1,196, up from $1,038 the year before. But local workers making 30% of the area median income — about $28,000 annually — can only afford $702 in rent.
At the $7.25 minimum wage in Indiana, a worker would need just over three full-time jobs to afford a fair market rate two-bedroom apartment in Bartholomew County.
Bradley said seniors living on a fixed income are increasingly being impacted the rising rents and housing costs.
“What we’ve seen is — and this is statewide— the largest percentage or proportion of the bottom 30% of area median income, or what we call extremely low-income households, the largest percentage are in the labor force,” Bradley said. “..But the fastest growing segment of the extremely low-income population is seniors. …Their fixed incomes aren’t matching increasing rents and housing costs.”
Local officials, for their part, are expecting that a housing study currently underway will help the city evaluate options and opportunities for affordable housing. City officials said the housing study is expected to be completed sometime this summer.
Like many communities, Columbus is at risk of losing affordable housing units in the coming years, could be at risk of losing nearly 200 more affordable housing units within the next five years should property owners not extend their agreements or obtain new subsidies when their contracts with the federal government expire, according to a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development database of housing and contracts.
Recently, BHI Senior Living announced plans to close an affordable housing complex for seniors in Columbus next year.
The Villas apartments, 4101 Waycross Drive, will be closed shortly after April 2025, when BHI Senior Living’s 40-year contract with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that subsidizes rent for residents of the 99-unit complex is set to expire, the company announced earlier this year.
“We know the city’s housing study, currently underway, will identify our need for more housing — specifically affordable housing,” Columbus Mayor Mary Ferdon said in a previous interview. “Losing the Villas makes our work even more critical as we evaluate both short-term and long-term options and opportunities.”
National trends
Nationally, workers in 33 states, including Indiana, earning their respective average hourly renter wage earn less than their state’s one-bedroom housing wage, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition.
Additionally, 14 of the nation’s 20 most common occupations pay median wages that are less than what a full-time worker needs to afford a modest one-bedroom rental home at the national average fair market rent, according to the coalition. A total of 64 million people, or 42% of the nation’s entire workforce, work in those 14 occupations.
“Although most indicators show that the economy is strong, the lowest-income renters continue to confront significant challenges finding and maintaining access to safe and affordable rental housing,” the coalition said in its 2024 report. “Insufficient wages, rising rents, and an inadequate housing safety net all contribute to the problem. Substantial, long-term investments in affordable housing solutions are desperately needed to address this crisis once and for all.”
