A roof over one’s head

Far too many people feel the squeeze, sacrificing in other areas to afford skyrocketing rents and little hope of scraping together the funds needed for a down payment. When you have record numbers of people experiencing homelessness, about half of renter-occupied households are spending over 30% of their income on housing (are considered “cost-burdened”), and people applying for housing vouchers waiting up to eight years to get financial assistance, something is deeply wrong. 

We feel that strain acutely here in Washington. In the Seattle-Bellevue-Tacoma area, the median home costs about $790,000. Assuming a 20% down payment and spending no more than 30% of one's income on housing, Redfin found that a homebuyer would need to make $215,000 a year to affordably own this median home. Considering that the median household income in this area is about half that, it's no wonder that so many people feel cost-burdened.

Energy usage: How housing relates to climate

Energy usage in a warming world

As the planet warms, the more extreme weather events have and will continue to occur. 2023 was the hottest year on record since we started recording. Beyond heat, we have more intense winter storms, hurricanes, forest fires, floods—every season brings more extreme weather events. To survive, we are retreating further into our homes, and as such, we need more energy for them. Air conditioning and air filtration are very rapidly becoming necessary in locales where the climate used to be mild enough to do without.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Washington state’s residential sector’s energy consumption was 479 trillion Btu in 2021. The energy required to meet this demand has to come from somewhere. We must examine our energy sources and take into account their impacts at every stage (generation, transport, waste, etc.) But it’s not enough to simply convert everything as-is to “greener” energy sources; we must also examine the ways our homes and communities are designed in order to reduce our energy demands before they hit the grid.

Density saves energy (source)

Everybody benefits when we dispense with parking minimum mandates and single-family-only zoning.

1. Essential locations such as home, work, shopping, and recreation can be built closer together. Commuting between these locations is more readily accessible by foot, bike, or other personal forms of transit that aren’t driving. This kind of access is highly desirable, hence the skyrocketing cost of living in these regions.

2. It is easier to build accessible and convenient public transit when there is less sprawl. Public transit becomes more desirable and thus more people will opt for it over driving. When more people have more transit opportunities, it opens up economic opportunities as well.

3. Fewer cars means less air and noise pollution, greater safety for people outside motor vehicles, and less congestion for drivers.

4. Building more densely reduces the distance required to transport everything from people to goods and energy, which saves energy.

5. Smaller private living spaces require less energy for temperature regulation.

6. Building more densely reduces urban sprawl.

All of these reasons, and more, are why design ideas like the “fifteen minute city” are gaining traction.  That being said, that kind of accessibility is currently considered a luxury, and it’s much more readily available to those that have the money to spend on it.

Money talks: How housing relates to equity

Given that housing is so foundational, we would be remiss to avoid talking about how housing disparities are intertwined with other forms of marginalization.

• Generational wealth.
  
  The National Association of Real Estate Brokers (NAREB) has a comprehensive report, the State of Housing in Black America (SHIBA) report, on this subject. They report that the 2022 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) found that the median Black household had a net worth of $24,520. Compare that with the median for white households, which was $250,400. Generational wealth can make or break someone’s ability to purchase a home, especially when putting down a smaller down payment means paying more for the property over the long term. Once acquired, that property tends to increase in value, leading to more wealth for the next generation. 
  
  

• Cost of accessibility.
  
  It’s expensive to retrofit a house, and most disabled people simply do not have that kind of money. Processing wait times for Social Security Disability claims are at a record high. Supplemental Security Income (SSI) is not enough to cover rent. And when you consider many disabled people can’t work full time and will have their disability benefits revoked if they accumulate any kind of savings or even get married, accessible housing becomes laughably out of reach.
  
  

• Redlining.
  
  Beyond the numbers game of wealth, BIPOC people have been actively kept out of “good” real estate markets by developers, landlords, realtors, and legislative bodies. Any non-white presence in a neighborhood was seen as a threat. Today, it’s usually not so overt as marking up neighborhoods in red ink—a “good” school is usually one that receives more funding due to the greater property tax values of the surrounding homes, which historically have had white residents, for example. But blatant racism in housing is still around. One house may be valued two different ways, simply because one appraiser believed the homeowner was white, and the other believed the homeowner was Black.
  
  

• Gentrification.
  
  When neighborhoods are “developed,” long-time residents are frequently displaced. The luckier ones take up residence in more affordable neighborhoods away from their communities, and are burdened with the financial expense of car ownership and/or the time lost to longer commutes, which has compounding effects on quality of life. The less fortunate may take up residence on the streets.
  
  

• Lack of access to green spaces.
  
  Less affluent neighborhoods have less tree cover and overall greenery compared to their more affluent counterparts, which makes these neighborhoods measurably hotter. This is known as the “urban heat island effect.” Furthermore, many BIPOC people don’t have access to “outdoorsy” activities such as hiking due to lack of access to green spaces, inability to afford the fees for equipment and entry, lack of time and energy due to the kinds of physical labor required for their jobs, or safety concerns about going outside alone. Additionally, existing green spaces are often not accessible to disabled people due to lack of adequate infrastructure (e.g. steep pathways, lack of seating).
  
  

• Toxin exposure in the home.
  
  When homeowners can’t afford to make repairs, or when landlords refuse to make repairs for their tenants, residents are exposed to toxins such as lead or mold.
  
  

• Deliberate siting that results in toxic exposure.
  
  Living near places like a major highway or industrial municipal waste site exposes residents directly to pollution, and this has distinct negative health outcomes, including higher rates of cancer. This kind of harm disproportionately falls on marginalized groups. Communities of color are frequently targeted for hazardous waste sites, and communities of color are frequently the ones bisected or even entirely destroyed in the development of major motorways.