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BUILDING ONLINE

Indianapolis and Youngstown, Ohio in Tie As Most Affordable Housing Markets

07/04/2007
WASHINGTON -- The metropolitan areas encompassing Indianapolis-Carmel, Ind. and Youngstown-Warren-Boardman, Ohio-Pa. tied for the title of most affordable major U.S. housing market in this year's first quarter, according to the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index (HOI), released recently. Meanwhile, lower home prices and mortgage interest rates helped boost housing affordability across the nation in the first three months of this year.

In the nation's most affordable major housing markets of Indianapolis and Youngstown, 89 percent of new and existing homes that were sold during the first quarter of this year were affordable to families earning those areas' respective median household incomes of $63,800 and $51,400. The median sales price of all Indianapolis homes sold in that time frame was $116,000 and the median sales price of all Youngstown-area homes sold was just $78,000. Also near the top of the list for affordable major metros in the first quarter was Dayton, Ohio, followed by Detroit-Livonia-Dearborn, Mich., and Grand Rapids-Wyoming, Mich., respectively.