Households paying 30% or more of their gross income for housing are considered to be housing cost-burdened. This definition of affordability is formally recognized by the housing industry. In this article, “housing cost burden” is used interchangeably with “paying too much for housing.”

  1. More than one in four Minnesota households pay too much for housing.

    Twenty-eight percent of Minnesota households are cost-burdened, up from 25% of households in 2019. This had been preceded by a decade of gradual declines in housing cost burden after the Great Recession.

  2. One in eight households is severely housing cost-burdened.

    Twelve percent of Minnesota households are severely housing cost-burdened, paying 50% or more of their income for housing. Severe cost burden increased with the onset of the pandemic, matching levels that we hadn’t seen since the Great Recession.

  3. Nearly half of renter households pay too much for housing.

    Forty-eight percent of Minnesota’s renters are housing cost-burdened, more than double the share of homeowners experiencing housing cost burden. Cost burden among renters has hovered between 45 to 50% of households for about two decades.

  4. Around half of Black Minnesotans, young adults, and lower-income Minnesotans are housing cost-burdened.

    Black Minnesotans, young adults, and lower-income Minnesotans experience particularly high levels of housing cost burden, with around half of householders in each of these communities paying too much for housing. Over the last decade, housing cost burden has declined among Black Minnesotans, but increased among young adults and lower-income Minnesotans.

Housing cost burden is especially high among:

Black Minnesotans

47 %

Householders age 24 or younger

51 %

Households with income less than $75,000

56 %

Dig into the data for more about housing in Minnesota.