Hilo housing costs are highest in nation, research shows (Honolulu: section 8, real estate)

[whtviper1]

Hmmm, Interesting story on Hawaii News Now today:

Hilo housing costs are highest in nation, research shows - Hawaii News Now - KGMB and KHNL

"At $1,833 Hilo residents pay the highest average amount of rent than anywhere else in the country. A family of four needs a combined income of more than $87,000 a year to live comfortably."

"When parents have a third child the costs increase even greater. In Hilo $116,440 is needed in combined income. In Honolulu with three kids $98,682 is needed."

"Honolulu was not the costliest on the list. In fact compared to other cities it's near the middle. At $78,000 with two parents and two kids Honolulu is much less expensive than New York City and San Francisco. It's about the same as San Jose and Los Angeles and higher than places like Tampa and Houston."

Two Parents, Two Children
Item Cost
Monthly Housing $1833
Monthly Food $754
Monthly Child Care $1315
Monthly Transportation $607
Monthly Health Care $1278
Monthly Other Necessities $662
Monthly Taxes $829
Monthly Total $7278
Annual Total $87337

[davephan]

That's surprising that Hilo is more expensive than Honolulu. The real estate on Oahu is drastically more expensive than the Big Island. For the rental cost to be higher on the Big Island, the costs for everything else, such as electricity, food, gas etc, would all have to higher on the Big Island, than Oahu for that to be true. I assume that the main factor determining a rental cost is the purchase cost of that rental property, rather than the other expenses.

Those income level numbers help support the obvious argument that you can't support a battalion of kids on a couple of minimum wage jobs, especially in Hawaii.

I think that is wrong about Tampa. Tampa's cost of living is drastically cheaper than Honolulu.

[hotzcatz]

It would be interesting to see where they got their numbers from and how they determined them. In one instance, they were quoting rent, healthcare and childcare all as $1,300 per month. Doesn't "healthcare" seem a bit steep? Also many folks have family to step in with childcare so that number should be all over the place.

Lovely numbers and all, but I'd suspect GIGO for the results.

Oh, wait a minute, we are supposed to be agreeing with these numbers and claiming it's terribly expensive to live here, huh? Well, foo. Those numbers look suspicious to me.

[Jonah K]

Originally Posted by davephan

That's surprising that Hilo is more expensive than Honolulu. The real estate on Oahu is drastically more expensive than the Big Island. For the rental cost to be higher on the Big Island, the costs for everything else, such as electricity, food, gas etc, would all have to higher on the Big Island, than Oahu for that to be true. I assume that the main factor determining a rental cost is the purchase cost of that rental property, rather than the other expenses.

Those income level numbers help support the obvious argument that you can't support a battalion of kids on a couple of minimum wage jobs, especially in Hawaii.

I think that is wrong about Tampa. Tampa's cost of living is drastically cheaper than Honolulu.

The study is probably comparing housing rental costs between Kalihi in Honolulu and Sunrise Ridge in Hilo.

[mdand3boys]

"At $1,833 Hilo residents pay the highest average amount of rent than anywhere else in the country."
----------------------
The real number is a little more than 1/2 of that, I suspect.

[OpenD]

Originally Posted by hotzcatz

Oh, wait a minute, we are supposed to be agreeing with these numbers and claiming it's terribly expensive to live here, huh? Well, foo. Those numbers look suspicious to me.

Same here. And this sentence just leaped out at me: "Honolulu was not the costliest on the list. In fact compared to other cities it's near the middle." Hard to believe anyone who knows anything about anything could say that that with a straight face.

The devil, as has been said many times, is in the details. Looking at the methodology of this report, issued by a political think tank, I see they did not survey actual renters on what they pay, and they did not survey rental listings for asking prices, and they did not survey... well, heck, they didn't survey anything at all.

What they compared was HUD estimates of Fair Market Rental (FMR) rates, which estimates are made locally to justify requests for Section 8 funding. Well shootz, I can't see any possible room for bias in those numbers, can you?

But who knows, maybe the Ouija Board (tm) method they used actually works. Let's just check a few key points against the numbers from the US Census Bureau's American Community Survey as of 2011...

Statistic ........................Honolulu...............Hil o
Population......................953,207........... .....43,263
Housing Units.................336,011................16,26 1
Rental Units....................174,863................5, 860
Units w/rent over $1.5K.....54,591...................872
Percent w/rent over $1.5K...31.2%................14.9%

[Fredesch]

Perhaps they limited the statistics to rent for houses with no heater or air conditioner. Since everywhere else, a house without neither heat or AC would be pretty bad. So you could compare horrendous houses in New York vs a nice houses in Hilo and get the numbers quoted. It would be a useless number since it doesn't represent livability or anything else. Really doubt whoever generated the data captured anything useful.

[oregonwoodsmoke]

Originally Posted by OpenD

.......................................

What they compared was HUD estimates of Fair Market Rental (FMR) rates, which estimates are made locally to justify requests for Section 8 funding. ....................................

OK, Section 8. So the figures just mean that Section 8 doesn't pay enough to rent a house in Honolulu or Manhattan.

It would be about $1800 a month for a family of 4 to rent a house on Hilo. Nobody can rent a house in Honolulu for $1800 a month. For that you get a tiny condo, not really big enough for a family of 4.

But I take some comfort to learn that Section 8 is not renting 3 bedroom houses in Honolulu for welfare recipients.

$1278 sounds about right for health insurance. It's $500-$600 for moderately good insurance for just one person. Of course it is going to cost more than that if 4 people are covered. However, if we are talking about welfare recipients receiving Section 8 housing, they are getting their health care for free.

If they are working people who earn their money for $1800 a month rent, they are probably getting health care through work, where the employer is paying the majority of the bill.

Section 8 does a bit of steering of their own (illegal for anyone else to do). They pay enough to rent a house in Waianae, so the welfare recipients all move to Waianae instead of living in Honolulu.

[Robin Rossi]

Originally Posted by oregonwoodsmoke

OK, Section 8. So the figures just mean that Section 8 doesn't pay enough to rent a house in Honolulu or Manhattan.

It would be about $1800 a month for a family of 4 to rent a house on Hilo. Nobody can rent a house in Honolulu for $1800 a month. For that you get a tiny condo, not really big enough for a family of 4.

But I take some comfort to learn that Section 8 is not renting 3 bedroom houses in Honolulu for welfare recipients.

$1278 sounds about right for health insurance. It's $500-$600 for moderately good insurance for just one person. Of course it is going to cost more than that if 4 people are covered. However, if we are talking about welfare recipients receiving Section 8 housing, they are getting their health care for free.

If they are working people who earn their money for $1800 a month rent, they are probably getting health care through work, where the employer is paying the majority of the bill.

Section 8 does a bit of steering of their own (illegal for anyone else to do). They pay enough to rent a house in Waianae, so the welfare recipients all move to Waianae instead of living in Honolulu.

A tiny sliver of justice in a world of freebies, free rides, parasitization off of the successful and fostering of habitual slothfulness - all of the above paid for by the 50% of us who actually pay Federal Income Tax (excluding the unemployed).

[OpenD]

Originally Posted by Fredesch

Perhaps they limited the statistics to rent for houses with no heater or air conditioner.

No, HUD's FMR estimates are based on a "modest apartment," which for a family of 2 adults and 2 kids, would be a no frills 2BR/1BA unit.

Originally Posted by oregonwoodsmoke

It would be about $1800 a month for a family of 4 to rent a house on Hilo.

I think that's a very high guess. As I said earlier, the 2011 figures from the US Census Department show only 11.2% of the rental properties in Hilo at over $1,500 per month, while 44% of those in Honolulu are over that. Glancing over Craigslist listings this morning I see a number of 2BR/1BA houses listed well under that figure, more like half of that figure, as mdand3boys suggested earlier.

Furthermore, Consumer Price Index figures, which are updated monthly, currently show Honolulu is 31% more expensive overall than Hilo, so by triangulation, I'm calling B.S. on this report. The conclusion offered in the EPI report is contradicted by too many facts.

As I said before, the report was prepared by the Economic Policy Institute, a political think tank centered around organized labor issues. It's possible they skewed the report to fit some agenda of theirs. Or the methodology may be flawed because of the kind of data they selected (remember, they did no surveys of their own), or the HUD data itself may be flawed. Or, it's even possible the EPI team just messed something up. I'd say that $833 a month rent would be far more believable than $1,833, and I could see human error producing that kind of mistake.

In any case, their conclusion that Hilo is more expensive than Honolulu defies common sense, is contradicted by more credible sources, and I think it earns a solid rating of Two Thumbs Down.