San Antonio's allure as a haven of housing affordability is under scrutiny, with new data and rising interest rates questioning the long-held belief in the city's cost advantages. Median home prices in San Antonio have jumped over 30% since 2019, posing a challenge to locals despite still being a bargain for those moving in from pricier urban areas. Newcomers from high-cost regions, such as the West Coast and Northeast, often find San Antonio's cost of living to be significantly easier to bear. "Originally from Connecticut, a short stint in California and now here, San Antonio is dirt cheap in every measurable comparison," one Reddit user's comment highlights the disparity in living costs, according to the San Antonio Report.
Although housing and rental prices appear to offer some relief from the financial strains, local earnings tell a different story, wages in San Antonio remain decidedly lower than the U.S. average, according to the San Antonio Report, with certain sectors experiencing a dip as large as 26% from the national median; this has significant implications for residents when it comes to meeting the rising costs of living. "Healthcare support" wages in San Antonio were reported being 18% lower, and the "arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media" sector saw a 26% drop in comparison to national averages, highlighting the wage gap within the community.
However, narratives of affordability might be further challenged by the dynamics of interest rates. As BizJournal's analysis of an interview with Adam Wayne Perdue, a research economist at Texas A&M's Real Estate Research Center, points out, higher interest rates had a significant impact on the decline in affordability over recent periods. "What you're seeing on the index is the interplay between the increases in mortgage rates defeating any fall in prices over the last year," Perdue said.
San Antonio's fight to maintain its image as affordable is complemented by efforts to boost the city's wage levels, seeing signs of success with new business sectors ushering in higher-paying jobs, such as a recent manufacturing plant expected to support a substantial number of new full-time jobs, with wages ranging from $20.55 to nearly $30 per hour, as per the city's campaign to attract high-quality jobs and industry growth, this aligns with Greater SATX's strategy to not only sell San Antonio as an affordable city but also one that offers competitive wages and career growth opportunities, "Being an affordable place to live is great, you want to be able to afford housing, food, luxuries, all that good stuff," Jim Perschbach, CEO of Port San Antonio, said in a quote obtained by the San Antonio Report.
The summer months ahead, with their traditional surge in home buying, could paint a clearer picture of the sustainability of San Antonio's affordable market, yet high interest rates may distort the expected trends, "We have some concerns that summer months might not be as busy as usual due to high interest rates," said Perdue in a statement reported by BizJournal. With wages and housing costs engaged in an intricate dance, and the unpredictable role of interest rates, San Antonio's reputation for affordability is in a delicate state of balance.
