Why Chapel Hill’s Affordable Housing Crisis Is Bigger than You Think

This is Matt Bailey.

When we talk about affordable housing, we often assume we’re talking specifically about homes for residents with low incomes.  Chapel Hill definitely has an affordable housing crisis by that standard.  Housing Choice (formerly Section 8) vouchers aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on here anymore.

However, Chapel Hill’s affordable housing crisis goes far beyond our most economically challenged neighbors.  Recently, a colleague of mine told me she and her husband are looking for a house.  They’re progressively minded professionals who value education, so I suggested they check out Chapel Hill.

“I’d love Chapel Hill,” she told me, “but there’s no way we can afford it.”

She showed me the numbers and she’s right.   While the average single family home in Durham costs $211,632, you’ll pay $443,416 on average in Chapel Hill, according to CityData.com statistics from 2012.   “But it’s worth it for our schools,” you argue.  However, the money you’ll save living in neighboring communities instead of Chapel Hill is almost enough to send a child to Durham Academy or Carolina Friends School.

It’s not just a few mansions distorting average home prices, either.  The fact is, if your family doesn’t make at least a-hundred-thousand dollars a year, chances are you won’t be able to find any single-family homes you can afford in Chapel Hill.  Adding insult to injury, not only will you pay more to live here, you’ll probably get a house that’s older, smaller and in worse condition than you’ll get for less money in neighboring communities.  While this situation may not have been the reality for longtime Chapel Hillians who purchased their homes decades ago, it is the reality today’s families with children see when evaluating the value of our community.

We’re no longer a town poor people can’t afford.  We’re a town middle class families can’t afford, either.

To help provide quality homes for our neighbors with the greatest need, it will take the support of local government and not-for-profits dedicated to the cause, such as Chapel Hill’s pending partnership with Raleigh-based DHIC Inc.  For everyone else, the only way we can solve our middle class affordable housing crisis is to allow the marketplace to create enough homes to meet the demand, including more condominiums and apartment homes for people who have neither the need nor desire to own a single family home.

Some say that solution will kill the character of Chapel Hill.  I say our failure to allow the marketplace to meet the need for new homes is killing the character of Chapel Hill.  The progressively-minded and culturally cutting-edge individuals who once gave Chapel Hill its character simply can’t afford to live here anymore.

Are we going to settle for building a few dozen affordable housing units for the lucky few who win the lottery for them, then smugly congratulate ourselves for creating affordable housing?  Do we merely want enough affordable housing so we can convince ourselves we still have our progressive stripes?

If we don’t work proactively to become a community with homes for people of all income levels, Chapel Hill will no longer be a community that attracts people who value the politically progressive, the creative cutting edge, the importance of education or the culturally diverse.  It will become an enclave for the wealthy.

Maybe some folks like the idea of living in a town where only rich people can live.  I hold out hope that more Chapel Hillians want a community where people share their values than one where they share their tax brackets.