How many households in Rhode Island spend too much on housing?
About 143K in 2022. That’s 32.9% of all Rhode Island households. These households spent at least 30% of their total income on rent or mortgage payments and utilities. The Department of Housing and Urban Development considers households that spend more than 30% of their income on housing to be cost-burdened. Cost-burdened households may have less money for other necessities such as food, healthcare, or savings.
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The number of cost-burdened households in Rhode Island decreased from 161 thousand in 2012 to 143 thousand in 2022. Cost burden considers both household income and housing costs, so factors affecting either of these can influence the number of burdened households. For example:
- Changes in wages, employment status, or the number of people in a household can impact household income.
- Changes in housing supply/demand or interest rates can affect costs.
A growing or declining US population can also affect the number of cost-burdened households. To counteract this, USAFacts analyzed the percentages of cost-burdened households rather than just the number. This prevents such population changes from skewing the data.
In 2022, 32.9% of Rhode Island households were cost burdened, slightly higher than the national average of 32.5%.
Cost burden varies for renters and homeowners. For example, during the Great Recession (2007–2009) unemployment rose, millions of homes entered foreclosure, and rental demand increased. By 2010, cost burden had increased among renters while staying flat among homeowner households.
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Since 2012, the proportion of cost-burdened owner households in Rhode Island has decreased from 33.4% to 24.7% in 2022. Meanwhile, cost burden decreased from 50.6% to 47.9% among renter households.
In 2018–2022, the metro areas with the highest and lowest share of cost-burdened owner households were the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, California metro area at 33.8% (highest) and Morgantown, West Virginia, at 12.8% (lowest). In Rhode Island, the highest was the Providence metro area at 25.7%.
In 2018–2022, the share of renter households in metro areas that were cost burdened was 50.5%. The metro areas in the US with the highest and lowest share of cost-burdened renter households were the Greater Miami metro area at 62.6% (highest) and Appleton, Wisconsin, at 32.8% (lowest).
The difference between the cost-burdened share of owner and renter households was narrowest in the Providence, RI area, where cost burden was 22.2 percentage points higher among renters than owners. Within the state overall, the gap was 23.2 percentage points.
