Rental Affordability Indexes

Dashboard Glossary

• Median: The middle number in an ascending list of values. Half the numbers are higher than the median, and half are lower.
• Area Median Income (AMI): The total household income of the middle household, when all household incomes in the area are ordered from smallest to largest. Half of households earn more than this amount and half earn less. The area of an AMI can refer to the entire state, a county, a town, or other geographic region.
• Median Renter Household Income: This is measured exactly the same as AMI but only includes those households that rent their home.
• Median 2-Bedroom Rent: This is our key measure of local rental rates, because 2-bedroom is the most common size among all rental housing units. The median rent estimates in this dashboard are "gross rent" estimates, meaning they are adjusted to include all utility costs.
• Household Income: The total earnings of all members of a household in a given year.
• Affordable: Housing is considered Affordable if the total Annual Housing Expenses are 30% or less of AMI. Or, for an individual household, if their total annual housing expenses are 30% or less of their gross household income. For the purposes of this dashboard, rent is Affordable if the annual rental amount is less than 30% of Median Renter Household Income.
• Affordability Index: This compares the Rent that is Affordable to the local Median 2-Bedroom Rent. If the index is greater than 1, rental homes in the area are generally unaffordable. If the index is less than or equal to 1, rental homes are generally affordable.
• Relative Change: The difference between a new value and an old value, divided by the old value and represented as a percentage.