PALM BEACH COUNTY, Fla. — More than 3,000 people responded to a WPTV Facebook post regarding our recent coverage of wages and rents in South Florida — and the message was clear: rising housing costs are pushing South Florida residents to a breaking point.
WATCH BELOW: Rising rents consuming 50% of income for many South Florida residents
Below is a snapshot of some of the responses to the Facebook post:
"The challenge is high prices and low wages," one person said.
"I'm wondering if these landlords were looking for a place, what their thoughts would be," another person said.
"So what is going to be done about this?" another commenter said, which doesn't seem easy to answer.
According to Dr. Ned Murray at the Jorge M. Perez Metropolitan Center at Florida International University, many renters in South Florida are now using 50% of their income on rent, far above the traditional baseline of 30%.
"Things really begin to break down, and that is increasing rapidly, and in fact here in South Florida, including Palm Beach (County) we have $320,000 renters who are now in that 50 percent and over category," Murray said.
Tackling affordability in housing is being talked about a lot lately, and it is on the minds of local elected officials.
"It is the most difficult thing we have to deal with; it is the one thing we get calls about every single day," Palm Beach County Commissioner Bobby Powell said.
In the current proposed budget for Palm Beach County, $228.7 million has been directed to housing programs, such as the Housing Initiatives Program and the Housing Bond Program.
"What we can do is when we allocate funds we can make sure that rents don't go over a certain amount," Powell said. "There are some units we approved on July 7 that won't be over 60 percent of the area median income."
