How much do you have to make each year to own a home in Cleveland? What about Chicago or St. Louis?
Consumer mortgage site HSH.com recently ranked the annual salaries you’d need to make to afford a house in 25 major cities across the United States. Cleveland ranked as the most affordable, with HSH.com saying that you’d need a yearly salary of just $19,435.17 to afford a median-priced home of $112,800. That mortgage would come out to a monthly payment of $453.49, not including property taxes and insurance.
What about Cincinnati? According to HSH.com, you’d need to make $22,226.95 to afford the mortgage loan on a median-priced home of $128,700, giving you a monthly mortgage payment of about $518.
Other Midwest cities were affordable, too. In St. Louis you’d need a yearly salary of $22,397.54 to afford a median-priced home of $130,300. Things get pricier in Chicago. You’d need to make $32,388.90 a year to afford a median-priced home of $187,100. And in Minneapolis, the only other Midwest city on the list, you’d need to make $33,800.09 to afford a median-priced home of $197,100.
San Francisco, to no one’s surprise, topped this list. You’d need to make an annual salary of $115,510.06 to afford a median-priced home of $682,410.
Of course, these numbers are all a bit misleading. There is far more to a monthly mortgage payment than principal and interest. Property taxes and insurance can drive monthly payments far higher. And as a resident of Chicago, I doubt whether a yearly salary of $32,000 or so would get you much of a home.
Still, the HSH.com survey is an interesting look at how affordable — or not affordable — housing can be across the country.
