Just How Bad Is Honolulu’s Housing Crisis?
The numbers don’t lie — the cost of living here is high.
Mayor Kirk Caldwell hosted a town hall meeting on his new , and more are in the works. Here’s a quick look at Honolulu’s housing crisis in five graphs:
Rents just keep going up…
But wages aren’t keeping up with rising inflation and rent increases:
In fact, the most popular job in Hawaii earns less than $11 per hour.
Meanwhile, home prices are rising…
And not much low-income housing is being built. A 2011 found that 70 percent of Hawaii’s housing need comes from low-income residents — individuals earning less than $53,700 and families of four earning less than $76,650 — but little has been built to meet that need:
In fact, the city loses more affordable units each year than it produces because of condo conversions and expiring deed restrictions, according to Charles Wathen from the Hawaii Housing Alliance.
