Louisville home prices rising faster than wages

Homeownership is climbing further out of reach for the average Louisville-area worker, whose earnings are failing to keep pace with home prices, a new study and federal wage data show.

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But police officers, firefighters and social workers are among the professions that can’t afford a fixed-rate, 30-year mortgage on a house costing $142,500 — the region’s median home price in 2006.

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To afford a median-priced house in the Louisville area in 2003, a buyer needed to make at least $41,141, according to the housing policy center. That amount had increased by 6 percent to $43,764 in 2005 and by 19 percent, to $48,816, last year

The median salary for a worker in the metro area was $27,269 in 2003, according to the Bureau for Labor Statistics. It rose by 3.5 percent to $28,226 by 2005, the most recent year for which data is available.