Affordability crisis hits state’s Latinos hard, study says

California’s shortfall in housing stock and the resulting affordability crisis are especially hard on Latino families, according to a new study by the Tomas Rivera Policy Institute.

Only 29% of Latino households could afford a median-priced home of $217,510 in California in 1999, compared with 37% for all households in the state during the same period. The affordability rate was 34% for African Americans; 55% for Asian Americans and 49% for whites. The national affordability rate was 55%.

In the Los Angeles area, where nearly 40% of all Latinos in the state live, and in other urban markets, housing prices have been rising faster than incomes, particularly for Latino families, the study said. Based on 1999 data, even a 5% increase in the median home price of a detached single-family home can lock as many as 44,833 California Latino households out of the market.

The study includes policy recommendations to help address housing needs for the projected growth of the state’s Latino population, which is estimated at an additional 7.2 million individuals by 2020.