Rents are Rising Steadily

Thirty-percent or less of income spent to meet housing costs is what the US Department of Housing and Urban Development considers affordable. 

Thirty-eight percent of all renter households in Albany County have housing costs that exceed 30% of their income. That's 19,269 households who can't afford their rent.

The 2010 HUD "fair market rent" for a 3-bedroom apartment in Albany County is $1,046 per month and rising.

A full-time worker at minimum wage earns $1,192 per month before taxes.

Source: http://www.huduser.org/datasets/fmr.html

Students

Many colleges and universities are finding that students have become annual fodder for substandard housing rented to students. Increasingly, the lack of decent affordable rental housing is impacting neighborhoods as well as institutions, not to mention the renters themselves.

Poverty & Housing

Learn more about poverty in the Capital District and the impact of housing on quality of life. Read this recent report by the Albany Diocese:  Poverty in the Diocese of Albany: A Threat to the Common Good.