Skyrocketing Housing Prices In Utah Could Lead To Increased Homelessness

Affordable housing across Utah is getting harder and harder to come by. According to KSL, the median price of homes on the Wasatch Front is just under $400,000. Most first-time home buyers can't afford a price like that.

Urban Utah real estate broker Babs DeLay said that first-time home buyers have been looking on the west side of Salt Lake City to find houses that they can afford. In addition, they're retreating to communities miles away from the city.

DeLay said, "So they're having to go to, really, suburbs like Magna, Tooele, Grantsville, up north, Ogden. They're also searching in the western part of Weber County and northern Utah County in Eagle Mountain and Saratoga Springs."

Most of the buyers are competing against investors in the area that have been sweeping up properties.

According to DeLay, Utah has lower interest rates, which lead to higher property prices. This is causing first-time home buyers to run out of the money that they had hoped to use for home improvements.

Ultimately, DeLay is worried that this cycle could lead to increased homelessness across the state. DeLay says that community and government leaders should "put heads together and really make a map of how we can get to affordable housing in the future without cutting out so many people."

A Utah Senate committee passed a bill last year that would spend $35 million trying to solve the state's housing crisis.

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