In a city of roughly 3 million, Austin is a hotbed of entrepreneurship, a thriving tech hub, and a home to the largest population of undocumented immigrants in the country.
But with the population growing and jobs dwindling, the once-trendy city is facing a looming housing crunch.
With the median price of a home soaring from $260,000 in 2015 to more than $1 million this year, Austinites are increasingly struggling to keep up with their bills and the rising cost of housing.
While the city’s economy is still struggling to recover from the worst of the Great Recession, housing prices are still going up.
The median Austin home price climbed more than 10% last year, to $876,000, according to Zillow.
While many of those new homes are being built in neighborhoods with affordable housing requirements, Austin’s median income, the amount people make per year, and median home value have also skyrocketed.
Austin has long had a high rate of foreclosures, but these new figures show a new surge of those homes being foreclosed on.
This trend, which is becoming more pronounced as the economy continues to deteriorate, has become a significant concern for many residents, who are trying to get by.
“It’s really, really stressful.
You just don’t have time to spend with your family,” said Sarah Wierzbicki, a 27-year-old Austin resident who is homeless.
“We’re kind of losing our mind trying to find a place to stay.”
Austin is home to some of the most expensive housing in the United States, with a median home price of more than half a million dollars.
The city is the most unaffordable place to be in the US according to a new report by the National Association of Realtors, and the affordability is only getting worse.
The average price of new housing in Austin increased 7% from $235,000 last year to $281,000 this year.
The NAR found that homes in Austin have increased by more than 20% in price from the previous year, while the median income in the city has dropped from $40,000 to $33,000.
Austin’s unaffordable housing has forced more people to move to other cities to avoid eviction.
Austin was the second-most unaffordable city in the U.S. for 2016, behind Detroit, according the NAR.
In 2016, 7% of Austin’s households lived below the poverty line, according a report by Zillows.
“That’s a very big problem in Austin,” said Michael J. Zaloga, vice president of marketing at Zillower.
“A lot of people are losing their homes and are finding themselves with a lot of debt, which could ultimately impact their ability to pay their rent and keep their home.
Austin is really starting to become a big problem for Austin residents.”
Austin’s affordability is on the rise because it has become so unaffordable to live there, said Sarah Kiely, an Austin native who works in real estate.
“People have been losing their houses and homes in this city, but it hasn’t been that long since they have.
It’s like they’ve been out here for a while, and they’ve just gotten stuck.”
While many people struggle to pay off their mortgages and other bills, others are trying their best to keep their families afloat, even as they struggle to make ends meet.
“I have two kids who don’t work, so I’m struggling with paying bills and rent,” said Laura B. Brown, a 40-year old Austin resident.
“And my husband is paying $100 a month, so it’s really hard to make any kind of a living.
So I’m trying to do whatever I can to make sure my kids don’t end up homeless.”
Brown is one of many residents who live paycheck to paycheck.
In her case, it’s a lot more than she has.
Brown is trying to keep her two daughters and son in Austin.
“The house is pretty much my life,” she said.
“My house is my life, and I want them to have a nice house.”
In addition to rising home prices, many Austin residents are struggling with homelessness.
According to a recent report by U.K.-based charity Shelter, the number of homeless people in Austin is now more than double the number from four years ago.
In the city, nearly 6,000 people are estimated to be homeless in the Austin area.
The group said that the number is expected to rise to nearly 20,000 by the end of 2019.
In Austin, a growing number of people living in shelters are finding it increasingly difficult to stay in the area, and there are signs that many are choosing to move out.
According the American Community Survey, there are nearly 1,500 homeless people living at the end a shelter, and those numbers are expected to grow even more.
“At this point,