Weekly Hours Needed for Construction Workers to Afford Homes

CA construction workers would need to work over 100 hours per week to afford the median-priced home

Source: Construction Coverage analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Zillow data | Image Credit: Construction Coverage

Inflated home prices in many cities mean that the workers who build homes often cannot afford to buy them. Indeed, California construction workers would have to work 101 hours per week to afford a median-priced home in their home state, more than double a typical 40-hour work week. This calculation assumes that a worker would spend no more than 30% of their income on housing, a common home affordability rule . Construction workers in Hawaii (90 hours), Utah (85 hours), and Idaho (80 hours) would also have to work over double the standard work week to manage the monthly mortgage payments for a median-priced home. At the other end of the spectrum, in West Virginia home prices are affordable enough—and construction median wages are high enough—that a construction worker would only have to work 28 weekly hours to be able to afford a median-priced home.

Similar trends hold at the metro level, where perhaps not surprisingly, metros in California stand out as being some of the most unaffordable in the country. Even though locations like San Jose, San Francisco, San Diego, and Los Angeles all offer above-average wages, homes there are so much more expensive than average that the typical construction worker would need to work the equivalent of at least three full-time jobs to afford one. At the opposite end of the spectrum, locations in America’s Rust Belt, such as Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and St. Louis, offer good-paying construction jobs and below-average home prices, making these locations highly affordable for a person in the trades.

Below is a breakdown of how many hours construction workers would need to work to afford a home in their area for the top and bottom metros and states. The analysis was conducted by Construction Coverage , a website that provides construction software and insurance reviews, using data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Zillow, and the U.S. Census Bureau. For the full analysis, see the original story Cities Where Construction Workers Would Have To Work the Longest Hours To Afford a Home on Construction Coverage.