The National Association of Realtors’ own affordability index, which stretches back to 1981, says that this July’s level set a lifetime record for the month. Home prices in Northeast metros such as New York—which remains the least affordable metro in the country—have dropped somewhat. But the most significant improvements are in California, Florida, Nevada, Arizona, and other hard-hit markets. In San Francisco, the second least affordable metro with a median home price of $580,000, 26.9% of homes sold in the second quarter were affordable to a family earning the median income of $96,800. That’s a big improvement from the same period in 2004 when only 13.3% of homes were affordable for median earners.
