Affordable housing remains in focus

If you’re like the rest of us in the newsroom at the Standard-Radio Post, you’re probably tired of hearing about affordable housing and short-term rentals.

This week we conclude our series on affordable housing but not our coverage. The special series was designed to give a more in-depth look at how these issues impact the community. The subject is a hot topic right now because of the impact it has. As long as it continues to impact the local economy and remains in discussion by elected officials, we will continue to keep our readers abreast of the subject.

With the average home in Fredericksburg now costing north of a half-million dollars, the ability of local businesses to attract and keep lower-wage workers is increasingly difficult, if not impossible. To raise wages to match the affordability of a house hear would result in the unrealistic inflation of prices for products and services. ($50 hamburgers anyone?)

We have established that there is clearly a tie to short-term rentals (STRs), or bed and breakfasts (B&Bs), to the rapidly rising house prices. Far too many homes are being snatched up at inflated prices and converted to STRs. The demand for housing here has far outstripped the supply. The ones who can afford to buy a home here generally come from places such as California where the inflation is far worse.

In this week’s story to conclude the affordable housing series, we take a look at people who cannot afford to live here. Too often children leave the nest, go off to college, but find they can’t come home again unless they move back in with their parents. Based on a question we asked a few weeks ago on Facebook, most people here could not afford to buy the home they live in if they had to buy it today.

This is a very precarious position to be in. Without workers, business suffers. When customers receive poor service or long waits because businesses lack staff, they leave bad reviews and they don’t come back. While that is bad for individual businesses, collectively it gives the city a bad reputation and ultimately costs us significant tourism dollars.

If tourists stop coming here, the need for STRs dries up, which would result in a glut of homes on the market with few buyers. The bigger picture would include large numbers of foreclosures and bankruptcies and a ruined economy. Nobody wants that. It’s for that reason that we must find ways of making homes in Fredericksburg affordable again. We need long-term residents and not short-term renters filling our neighborhoods.

In addition to having homes for service industry workers, we need places where new families can get their start. We need places that new teachers and law enforcement officers can afford. We need our children to be able to branch out and live here. Fredericksburg should be a good place to be, and not just a good place to be from.

We applaud the city in its efforts to hire a housing coordinator to confront this problem. The problem is serious enough to warrant the focused attention. Let’s hope this person is successful in his or her mission.

In the meantime, no matter how tiresome the topic becomes, we know it’s important and we will stay on top of it to keep our readers informed. – J.S.

(Editorial in the July 14, 2021, edition of the Fredericksburg Standard-Radio Post)