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Many in Wake County say housing affordability is a very or fairly big problem — 76% of registered voters, according to a new poll. But only 36% said housing availability is a very or fairly big problem.
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And 54% strongly or somewhat disagreed that building more housing will help bring down the overall cost of housing in Wake County.
“People do not necessarily tie that supply and demand equation together,” Joe Goode, chief insights officer for Statara Solutions, told a crowd of about three dozen at a Raleigh Rising town hall Thursday night.
Organized by the Raleigh Regional Association of Realtors, Raleigh Rising is an educational campaign designed to teach Wake County residents about housing affordability and availability, and give them tools to participate in discussions and decisions about growth and development in their communities.
The March survey of 500 registered Wake County voters is one element of the campaign. Raleigh Rising has also developed a free Community Advocate Handbook that defines zoning and development terms, explains the zoning process and provides scripts, email templates and contact information so residents can easily give feedback on development issues.
Yes, Realtors are behind this initiative, which is intended to ultimately boost the housing supply in Wake County. And Realtors stand to profit when people buy and sell homes.
But an increase in housing availability can benefit more than just Realtors. Owning property is key to obtaining generational wealth, Morgan Mansa, director of housing affordability and community revitalization for Wake County, said at the town hall.
There’s a housing supply problem in Wake County and throughout North Carolina. The population of Wake County grows by 66 people every day — including births and new residents, Mansa said. And that growth is expected to continue, as more jobs are created.
Wake County is expected to be 110,000 homes short of demand by 2029. But the county already has an affordable housing gap of 67,279 units, Mansa said.
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“We have to be intentional around what we build,” Mansa told the crowd. “So yes, supply is incredibly important, but we need to be very thoughtful around what that supply looks like.”
In the past decade, the people seeking affordable housing has changed, Mansa said, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and Wake’s growth. College graduates are seeking affordable places to live, and multi-generational households are becoming more common.
“It’s not always the traditional folks that we were housing 10 years ago,” Mansa said. “It’s absolutely creeping up more into the middle income and the middle class trying to find housing options within our market.”
Multiple people asked about messaging — getting the public to understand the affordability issues and recognize the need for more housing, and framing the issue in a way that doesn’t automatically make people oppose new developments in their neighborhoods.
Jones said that’s where elected officials can help.
“I think we’re missing the boat on saying what the property tax incentives are, of why building denser and higher will help with their property taxes and keeping them low,” Jones said. “I think we need to really focus on that aspect instead of just the who we can affect. The people who we need on our side are in their silos because they’re in their home, and they’re not necessarily worried about — or even concerned with — the people who need to move in.”
Mansa added that some people don’t understand what affordable housing looks like, or what is considered affordable.
“Oftentimes people who are against affordable housing, they purchased their home decades ago,” Mansa said. “And so they’re not fully aware of how much people are actually paying today.”
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