Here’s the portion of homes in Boston you can afford based on your job
Places with cheaper homes aren’t always more affordable for the people who live and work there.
If you work in food service, the number of homes you can afford in the Boston metro area is limited. In fact, it’s limited to 3.8 percent of homes on the market, according to Zillow.
The real estate listing site recently analyzed median incomes and budgets for various occupations throughout the country to see where workers could find the most homes within their budget.
The incomes – for occupations like lawyer, teacher, firefighter and construction worker – are based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau, and a person’s hypothetical budget is based on what homeowners typically spent on housing payments between 1985 and 1999. (A 20 percent down payment is assumed.)
The findings indicate that the areas with the cheapest homes are not always the most affordable.
For example, it turns out teachers can afford a higher percentage of homes in Boston than in many other parts of the country.
In notoriously expensive places to live like Boston, Los Angeles and San Francisco, teachers can find more listings within their budget than teachers searching in Salt Lake City or Portland.
According to Zillow, teachers make a median salary of $46,000 in the Boston metro area, letting them afford 38 percent of the local listings, or up to a $282,000 home.
This coincides with the recent WalletHub study that ranked Massachusetts as the best state for teachers, based on “job opportunity & competition’’ among other things.
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“There’s a lot more to home buying affordability than just the cost of the home. Incomes vary a lot across the country – even within the same occupation,’’ said Zillow Chief Economist Dr. Svenja Gudell in a statement. “There’s also the question of how much of your paycheck you’re willing to put toward a house payment, and finally, whether you can find a home in your price range.’’
Two other jobs in Boston also give workers access to a variety of listings they can afford – firefighters and lawyers/judges.
Firefighters make a median salary of $70,000 and can afford 65.5 percent of the listings, up to a $429,000 home, according to Zillow. Meanwhile, lawyers/judges make a median salary of $104,000 and can afford 82.5 percent of listings, up to a $638,000 home.
Construction workers and food-service workers don’t fare as well in Boston, according to Zillow.
Construction workers make a median salary of $30,000 in the Boston metro area and can afford 16.3 percent of the listings, up to a $184,000 home, while food service workers make a median of $14,000 and can afford 3.8 percent of listings, up to a $85,000 home.
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