HOUSING AND TRANSPORTATION

AFFORDABILITY INDEX

July 24, 2013

East Central VT Sustainability Consortium MeetingJason Rasmussen

Senior Planner

http://www.streamlinerefinance.net/cost-of-commuting.html

Why develop an H+T affordability index?

To start a conversation about choosing where to live.

This index, which is based on work by the Center for

Neighborhood Technology, is a tool to measure the true

affordability of housing choices.

What is affordable in Vermont?

Affordable housing is “housing that is owned or rented by its inhabitants

whose gross annual household income does not exceed 80% of the county median income [...] and the

total annual cost of the housing [...] is not more than 30% of the household’s

gross annual income”.

24 VSA § 4303

What about transportation costs?

In rural areas housing is often less expensive, but that often means that transportation costs

are higher as people have to travel further.

Transportation is considered affordable when a household

pays no more than 15% of its annual income on

transportation (Center for Neighborhood Technology)

Regional Housing Affordability

Center for Neighborhood Technology H+T Affordability Index

http://www.cnt.org/

Are our towns affordable?

Ando

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Balti

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Caven

dish

Chester

Ludlow

Reading

Sprin

gfield

Wea

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sfield

Wes

t Winds

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Winds

or0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Estimated transporta-tion costs as a percent-age of 80% of the County's median household income

Esti

mate

d c

osts

45% housing + transportation affordability target

30% housing affordabil-ity target

Questions?

Jason Rasmussen, Senior Planner802-674-9201jrasmussen@swcrpc.org