Here's The Hourly Wage Needed To Rent In Loudoun County

LOUDOUN COUNTY, VA—A modest two-bedroom apartment is out of reach for the typical minimum-wage worker charting a 40-hour week in any state. Furthermore, that same worker couldn't afford a one-bedroom rental in 99 percent of counties in the United States. That's according to an annual report published in June by researchers at the National Low Income Housing Coalition, which looked at rental costs in counties and metro areas nationwide.

Picture the scenario of a single parent living with children in a two-bedroom rental. In Loudoun County, the hourly wage necessary to afford a two-bedroom rental at fair market rent is $32.02, significantly more than the $23.13 needed to rent in the state overall and the national wage of $22.96.

Here's the breakdown for Loudoun County, (see page 257 of the report):

• Cost of a two-bedroom apartment: $1,665
• Yearly income needed to afford a two-bedroom apartment: $66,600
• Number of full-time jobs at minimum wage needed to afford a two-bedroom rental: 4.4

At the national level, renters earning the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour fall far short of the hourly income needed to live in a two-bedroom home — $15.71 an hour, to be exact. To afford even a one-bedroom, they would need to earn more than $5 an hour more.

But that struggle isn't limited to low-wage workers. The average hourly wage for American renters also falls short by $5.39 an hour for a two-bedroom and $1.08 for a one bedroom.

"As a result, an average renter must work 52 hours per week to afford a modest two-bedroom apartment of his or her own, a challenging task that is even more difficult for a single parent of a young child or a person with a disability," the report said.

The report blamed low wages, wage gaps, inequality along racial lines and a severe shortage of affordable and available rentals as reasons that too many Americans struggle to put a roof over their heads. These reasons are also why on average a renter making the federal minimum wage would have to work 127 hours every single week to afford a two-bedroom rental and 103 hours a week to afford a one bedroom.

The housing wage was based on fair market rents provided by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, which are the agency's best estimate of what families can currently expect to pay for a modest rental home. It does not reflect what all current renters are paying on average, rather the number is typically the 40th percentile of rents that a family can be expected to pay.

Patch national staffer Dan Hampton contributed to this report.