More than half of Oklahoma City’s renter families with children are spending too much of their paychecks just to keep a roof over their heads. A new analysis finds that 52.2 percent of these families are considered rent burdened, meaning they hand over more than 30 percent of their household income to rent every month, just shy of the 54.1 percent national rate.
The numbers come from a Zillow and StreetEasy analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data, as reported by The Journal Record. Roughly one in two Oklahoma City renter families are financially stretched, according to the analysis, and the squeeze is especially tight for households trying to find space for kids. In Oklahoma City, 33.3 percent of family households rent rather than own their homes, per the same report.
The Math Behind the Squeeze
The median annual rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Oklahoma City sits at $13,800, while a three-or-more-bedroom rental runs $19,500 a year, the analysis found. Those figures land against a median family household income of $88,307 in Oklahoma City, well below the national median family household income of $107,800. Even so, the report notes that Oklahoma City’s two-bedroom and three-or-more-bedroom rents rank among the lowest of the 50 major metros Zillow analyzed.
That relative bargain doesn’t erase the underlying supply problem. Nationally, just over one-third of rental listings offer two bedrooms and fewer than one-quarter offer three or more, the analysis found, while in Oklahoma City specifically, 33.1 percent of rental listings offer two bedrooms and 37.1 percent offer three or more bedrooms. Families needing larger rental spaces face limited and costlier options as a result, with that scarcity of affordable family-sized apartments pushing competition and costs higher in markets nationwide, including Oklahoma City, per the same account.
A National Housing Shortfall
Zillow points to a broader structural gap driving the squeeze: the report notes the United States is short 4.7 million homes overall. Addressing the shortage, according to Zillow, will require streamlining permitting, ramping up construction, and easing zoning restrictions that currently limit where new housing can go…