To purchase a median-priced home in any of these 15 metros, construction workers would need to work year-round overtime. An analysis conducted by home improvement site Porch looked at numbers from Zillow’s Home Value Index along with the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Occupational Employment Survey. Not only were the median wage of construction workers and median home prices compared, but the report considered the fact that construction workers cannot work remotely, they must commute to the jobsite. The top four unaffordable metros are located in California with San Jose being the most unaffordable.
The analysis took into account the changing employment and construction spending levels from 2000 to 2020, to illustrate how sensitive the sector is to broader economic trends, including the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic this year.
For example, the analysis showed that the seasonally adjusted annual rate of construction spending declined from its peak of $1.44 trillion in February 2020, before the pandemic hit, to $1.36 trillion in July, while construction employment decreased from 7.6 million to 7.2 million workers.
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