Economy
Mapping America's Renters
A new map provides a detailed look at the nation’s twofold housing crisis.
Jobs may be finally recovering following the Great Recession, but housing has a long way to go before it begins to bounce back. The Census Bureau reported Tuesday that the U.S. homeownership rate has declined to 63.4 percent, the lowest it has been since 1967.
A map by the journalist and web developer Ken Schwencke shows just how much the rental market now dominates U.S. cities, even those traditionally defined by high rates of homeownership. “Where the Renters Are” plots 2013 American Community Survey data on who’s renting (red dots) and who’s owning (blue dots) across the country’s census tracts. The dots, each of which represents 25 housing units, are randomly placed within tracts.