Teachers are struggling to buy homes — here’s where to turn for help

US teachers can barely afford homes near where they teach.

The average teacher can afford just 12% of homes for sale within 20 minutes of driving distance from their schools in 2023, a recent Redfin analysis found. That’s down from 17% last summer and 30% in 2019. A listing is considered affordable if the monthly mortgage payment is no more than 30% of the teacher’s median salary in that area, assuming a 10% down payment.

As a result, government and private programs are offering ways to help teachers buy homes to help alleviate the teacher shortage crisis across the country.

"Whether there are down payment assistance programs or really low down payment programs specifically for teachers, we need to have specific programs to combat this issue," Chen Zhao, Redfin's economics research lead, wrote to Yahoo Finance, "similar to the way we have programs for groups like veterans."

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