For most of us, living in the contemporary United States means engaging in a weekly struggle to secure enough money to meet our basic needs. If we take for granted all of the merit involved in “eating by what you earn,” the question remains: ‘What is reasonable and fair when it comes to the wages we earn from our labor and what it costs to secure safe and decent housing?’ Analysts, advocates, and policy people have sought insight on this housing stability question in a variety of ways. This analysis focuses strictly on the data by comparing the housing stability characteristics of Greenville—a metro showing progressive signals—to metros that share its baseline housing stability profile.
The Greenville MSA hit our radar after we identified it as a housing stability peer of Louisville. It emerged as the top-dog among Louisville’s set of peers when the benchmarking analysis was complete. This initial benchmarking was based on a seven-measure scorecard spanning homeownership, rental affordability, and the concentration of cost-burdened households. Unsatisfied with the lack of balance, which ultimately led to the homeownership metrics counting more than the others, the scorecard was revised to ensure that each category consisted of three metrics each. With these improvements in place, we took a deeper look at Greenville to test how progressive it would be when we centered this metro in the same way we centered Louisville.
Is Greenville Still the King of the Hill?
When all is said and done, the latest American Community Survey data (US. Census Bureau. 2024. “1-Year Estimates.”) shows that Greenville’s progressive signals are substantiated. At the same time, Greenville’s light is diminished just a bit by the fact that it has to share the title of best on housing stability with Dayton. In the previous analysis, Greenville was the clear superior with some elbow room.
Source: US Census Bureau. 2024. "American Community Survey, One-Year Estimates."
The table above shows Greenville earned top marks for homeownership-related housing stability and stability with respect to low concentrations of cost-burdened households. The one housing stability area where Greenville faltered was rental affordability. Greenville did decent compared to its peers on family-centered (AMI-based) rental affordability, but was subpar on both general and Black American-focused rental affordability. Greenville excelled on the homeownership rate metric, Black homeownership equity, and on the cost-burdened households measures. Indications show that Greenville offers a stronger-than-usual housing stability environment for its residents, especially homeowners, but renters and new homebuyers are likely to find this metro less welcoming.
Dayton
Source: US Census Bureau. 2024. "American Community Survey, One-Year Estimates."
Dayton joins Greenville at the top of the hill, and does so in an uncanny fashion. Unlike Greenville, which placed first in two out of the three housing stability categories, Dayton tied for the best overall score by remaining consistently high across measures; and doing so without placing first in any one category (see table above). Indications suggest that Dayton’s final position is largely due to its strong rental affordability numbers in comparison to Greenville’s weaker numbers. Essentially, Dayton kept enough pace with Greenville in Greenville’s strong categories and showed strength where Greenville was weakest. Dayton was strongest with respect to its much smaller home-buying affordability gap and by having the largest percentage of residents who can afford market-rate rent. Out of all of these metros, indications suggest that Dayton has the most welcoming housing stability environment, free of caveats.
Louisville
Source: US Census Bureau. 2024. "American Community Survey, One-Year Estimates."
Louisville comes in a distant third place among the metros in Greenville’s housing stability context. It is nine points behind both Greenville and Dayton in the final rankings, and ties with Buffalo. Louisville’s final ranking is attributable to a middling performance on homeownership measures, a poor performance on rental affordability measures, and a strong performance on the cost-burdened households metrics. Louisville’s best showing was on the Black cost-burdened households measure, with its worst showing coming from only doing better than Pensacola on each of the rental affordability metrics.
Buffalo
Source: US Census Bureau. 2024. "American Community Survey, One-Year Estimates."
Buffalo ties with Louisville in the final rankings, while taking a distinct path to get to its final score. Buffalo was most similar to Louisville on the homeownership measures, scoring 1-point worse than Louisville, which meant a second-to-last placement. However, Buffalo showed some strength on the rental affordability measures, with its third-place finish masking the fact that it was only three points away from first place. In the end, Buffalo took a step back on the cost burden measures, coming in fourth place whereas Louisville came in second place and doubled Buffalo’s score for this category. Buffalo’s best performance was on the Black rental affordability measure where it came in first place. Interestingly, its worse performance was a fifth-place finish on the Black homeownership equity metric.
Milwaukee
Source: US Census Bureau. 2024. "American Community Survey, One-Year Estimates."
Milwaukee is the first metro to stand alone in its ranking, coming in a distant fifth place on housing stability within the Greenville context. As the table above shows, the Milwaukee MSA had the distinction of either placing first in a category or last. When all was said and done, its strong performance on the rental affordability measures kept Milwaukee out of last place. Milwaukee was the strongest on family-centered (AMI-based) rental affordability, but performed dreadfully compared to its peers on every homeownership measure and on two out of three cost burden measures.
Pensacola
Source: US Census Bureau. 2024. "American Community Survey, One-Year Estimates."
Pensacola may be a beautiful place to live, but with respect to housing stability and housing stability alone, our indications show that things aren’t going well. When it comes to Pensacola’s performance across categories, things started out well enough. Despite its large home-buying affordability gap, Pensacola still placed second among its peers on the homeownership measures. Things went downhill from there. In the same way that Milwaukee did not earn a single point on the homeownership measures, Pensacola didn’t earn on a single point for rental affordability. This metro did a little better on the cost burden measures, but this ‘better’ only amounted to two points being added to its final score. Pensacola’s best performance was on the homeownership rate metric, where it came in first place.
Overall, it can be said that when Greenville's housing stability characteristics are placed under greater scrutiny, this metro stands up strong to the test. Although its progressive standing is somewhat tarnished by tying with another metro, the data clearly shows that Greenville is a standout metropolis when it comes to balancing prosperity with ensuring the housing stability of a wide multitude of households.
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