NoVa residents feel pressure to pay high rent, mortgages

A spring survey showed more than half of residents polled in the greater Washington, D.C., area are concerned with making rent or mortgage payments in 2023, highlighting the lack of affordable housing in the nation’s fourth largest metropolitan area.

Fifty-two percent of D.C., Maryland and Virginia residents polled by Gallup and the nonprofit Greater Washington Community Foundation said they were either “very worried” or “somewhat worried” last year, up from 31% in 2020. Virginians in Arlington, Fairfax and Loudoun counties and Alexandria didn’t differ much from their neighbors, checking in at 51%.

“I think it relates to the ongoing economic impact of the pandemic, and we will be dealing with that for a long time,” says Darius Graham, managing director of community investment at the Greater Washington Community Foundation.

Northern Virginia, like many metro areas, is suffering from a shortage of affordable housing. In April, Zillow reported that seven cities in Virginia had become “million-dollar” cities, where median single-family home purchases had eclipsed the $1 million mark, part of a new national trend.

And Virginians in the survey, Graham says, were less likely to want low-income housing coming to their communities. That can lead to legal disputes, depending on the circumstances.

In Arlington County, a zoning change that allowed multiunit residential buildings in formerly single-family housing neighborhoods led to a lawsuit by unhappy neighbors and a bench trial in July. (A ruling was expected in late August, after this story’s press deadline.)

Graham is focusing on how to influence that mindset. Policy changes would be the best way, experts agree. Measures like low-income property tax credits, emergency rental assistance and food assistance are ways to lift communities up.

“There isn’t just one wave-a-magic-wand solution to this,” says Ryan McLaughlin, CEO of the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors, adding that these challenges affect both home ownership and rental markets in the region.

But McLaughlin is also quick to point out the “silver linings” in the poll. Virginians in the survey rated availability of grocery stores, entertainment, access to health care and other quality-of-life measures higher than their neighbors in Maryland and the District.

Another boon for the commonwealth came from CNBC in July, when it ranked Virginia the No. 1 state for business for a record sixth time.

“It seems to me that Virginia has a leg up on the region,” McLaughlin says.