Housing Affordability in U.S. Remained Flat in 2017

According to the National Association of Home Builders / Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index released this week, data for all four quarters of 2017 show housing affordability remaining essentially flat throughout the full 2017 year.In all, 59.6 percent of new and existing homes sold between the beginning of October and end of December were affordable to families earning the U.S. median income of $68,000. This is just slightly up from the 58.3 percent of homes sold that were affordable to median-income earners in the third quarter, and effectively the same rate as in the fourth quarter of 2016, when the HOI stood at 59.9 percent.