Home > Why Open 4000 Doors > The Need For Housing

The need for affordable housing

In the last two decades, it has been increasingly difficult for people to find a safe, affordable home. With the current economic turmoil, this housing crisis is becoming dire.

Expenses aren’t adding up

  • Photograph of ResidentsHousing costs are going up. An average apartment in the Twin Cities costs nearly $900 a month. To afford this apartment, someone earning minimum wage ($6.15 an hour) would need to work over 100 hours a week.
  • There are more people earning less. One out of four current job openings in Minnesota pays less than $8.82 per hour. The average CommonBond household earns $13,000 a year or about $6.77 per hour, slightly above minimum wage.
  • This trend isn’t new. In five years (from 2000 to 2005), the cost of renting an apartment rose by 6% and worker’s average income fell by 15%. This increase means that families and seniors have been under an increasing strain for a long time.
  • The rash of foreclosures makes finding and keeping housing even more difficult. There has been a 75% increase in foreclosure filings in the Twin Cities in the past year. Most people who go through foreclosure no longer qualify to buy a home and due to the financial strain, many can no longer afford a market rate apartment.
  • Nearly one in five households in the greater Twin Cities region are both low-income and cost burdened, paying more than 30% of their income for housing. A cost-burdened household must cut back on other expenses like food and healthcare to avoid homelessness.

There aren’t enough homes to help

  • Photograph of ResidentMinnesota will need 50,000 more affordable homes by 2020 to solve the increasing housing crisis.
  • There are 5,800 households on waiting lists for CommonBond housing. Some, like a woman applying to Winnetka West in Minneapolis, call nearly every week to see if somehow there is an opening. But each time she calls, the property manager has to tell her that there are no vacancies.

Without homes, communities bear the consequences

  • Photograph of residents10,000 people experience homelessness on any given night in Minnesota. - Wilder
  • “[Homeless and highly mobile students without stable housing] as a group have the highest risk for low achievement. Achievement gaps are clear among the youngest students… and these gaps remain or worsen over time” –CURA Reporter summer 2008
  • Communities end up paying for the lack of affordable housing with services. In 2003, Hennepin County reported that for each family living in housing with supportive services, county costs for services such as emergency room visits were reduced by an average of $6,200.
  • Thank you to Wilder Research, Jobs Now Coalition, The Minnesota Homeless Coalition and Hennepin County for sta