Rural Families Plagued by Shortage of Affordable Housing, HAC Study Finds

Finding affordable, adequate housing is nearly impossible for most rural residents, a recent study from the Housing Assistance Council (HAC) found. Almost one-fourth of all rural households pay more than the standard 30 percent of their incomes for housing — including three million households who pay over half of their incomes for housing. The HAC report, State of the Nation’s Rural Housing: Rural Housing and Welfare Reform, was released in December 1997.

CPA’s 1998 Progressive Policy Agenda features strategies to create partnerships among business, government and community groups that will expand affordable housing opportunities in rural areas. To see the complete agenda as it appeared in the January issue of Alternatives, contact CPA or visit CPA’s website, http://www.cfpa.org.

Rural residents often face the same economic crises traditionally associated with inner cities. As is the case in many urban communities, minorities in rural areas are disproportionately likely to be poor and encounter housing problems, the study says. Rural African-Americans are more likely to live in grossly sub-standard housing than are rural whites or urban African-Americans. Native Americans face some of the worst housing conditions in the U.S.

While welfare reform initiatives have had an impact on rural poverty and housing, most rural families still don’t earn enough income to afford adequate housing and must supplement their earnings with welfare in order to live.

“Rural families may already be earning as much as they can, but even so they are not able to get out of poverty and into decent housing with decent futures for themselves and their children,” said HAC Executive Director Moises Loza.

For a copy of the report, contact Heidi I. Jones at HAC, 202-842-8600, or email [email protected].