Albany region housing affordability and availability data – Albany … – The Business Journals

What the data says about the Albany region’s housing affordability and availability, how much new housing we have (and need) and just how different the profile of a first-time homebuyer is today than in the past.
THE CHANGING FACE OF THE FIRST-TIME HOMEBUYER
In 1980, the average first-time homebuyer was in their 20s, married, put up a 27% down payment and had a mortgage of under $55,000. Today? That homebuyer is much more likely to be single, in their late 30s and facing a mortgage that’s six times as much — or even more — than a similar homebuyer in 1980. The age of first-time homebuyers had crept up since 1980, but shot up over the past few years as a hot housing market priced out more and more would-be buyers. Even more drastic: The median age of all homebuyers has increased by 20 years since 1980, showing the difficulties younger generations face when it comes to buying their own home.
WHAT $400,000 MIGHT GET YOU IN DIFFERENT LOCATIONS
We looked at some homes currently or recently on the market to see what a budget around $400,000 could get you in different locations of the region. These are all single-family homes, with some being new construction. A look at what $400K can get you in different areas:
HOW MANY NEW HOMES ARE GOING UP
Building permits don’t always tell the full story, but they do give a general estimate of how much building activity is going on in a region. We’re averaging more single-family building permits so far this decade than in the 2010s, but we’re far behind the building boom of the late ‘90s and early 2000s. Here’s a look at the annual average for single-family permits in the Albany metro area:
HOUSING AFFORDABILITY (OR THE LACK THEREOF)
Here’s the good news: The Albany area ranks in the top 15 among large metro areas for housing affordability, according to the Home Ownership Affordability Monitor.
But that good news comes with a big caveat: Even though we rank well for affordability, we still have a HOAM score of under 100, which means we’re considered an unaffordable area for the median resident. HOAM is run by the Center for Real Estate Excellence at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, which measures costs, interest rates and income in an area and comes up with a number on home affordability. A score of 100 indicates that someone earning the median income would be able to purchase and mortgage a median-price home in a region while spending 30% or less of their income on a mortgage. A higher score means homes are more affordable; a lower score indicates homes are less so. Nationally, the HOAM stands at 69.5, which is among the lowest scores since the index was started in 2006. Only nine metro areas in the U.S. with more than 500,000 population have affordable housing, with Scranton-Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania, having the highest score at 107.6. San Francisco is the least affordable metro area in the country, with a HOAM score of 35.6. By comparison, the Albany metro’s score in January 2021 was 130.4 — considerably more affordable than anywhere in the country just two years later.
HIGHER PRICES, FEWER HOMES ON THE MARKET
The median home price in the Albany region has jumped more than a third over the past five years. That coincides with a near record-low inventory of houses on the market. The Realtors’ rule of thumb: A balanced housing market typically has about five to six months of inventory. Our region is now under two months’ worth of inventory.
WHERE THE PRICES ARE HIGHEST IN THE REGION
Saratoga County has both the highest median price and most of the highest-priced spots so far this year.
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