Last updated: 09/29/2024
The Location Affordability Index (LAI) estimates the percentage of a family’s income dedicated to the combined cost of housing and transportation in a given location. Because what is “affordable” is different for everyone, users can choose among a diverse set of family profiles—which vary by household income, size, and number of commuters—and see the affordability landscape for each in a given neighborhood, city, or region. LAIM Version 2 employs an SEM regression analysis for auto ownership, transit use and housing costs and a second-order flexible form of ordinary least squares (OLS) model for VMT. It allows for all of the input variables to be used in the calculation of the coefficients. This somewhat complex modeling technique is employed to better model interactions between the endogenous variables. The goodness of fit is now measured by a combination of measures rather than by a simple R-squared value (see Section V. Model Structure and Formula, Aii. on goodness of fit measures on page 22 for further discussion). Additionally, to keep the model as simple as possible, input measures of transit access are no longer used. However since two endogenous variables are themselves measure of transit use (i.e., percent of commuters using transit for journey to work for home-owners and renters), the model works well. These revisions allow LAIM Version 2 to model housing and transportation costs by tenure for households in urban, suburban, and rural settings.Downloads
- Location Affordability Index (HUD) Washington (csv)
- Location Affordability Index (HUD) Washington - 2024 (csv)
Theme
- Affordability
Keywords
- location
- affordability
- index
| Key | Value |
|---|---|
| contactPoint | AHDP (email) |
| publisher | Housing and Urban Development |
| identifier | d5ef5e9a-d601-40ca-91d2-bc3b20b34ae1 |
| accessLevel | public |
| accrualPeriodicity | R/P10Y |
| issued | 2020-08-05T00:00:00+00:00 |
| modified | 2024-09-30T00:00:00+00:00 |