SEATTLE, Washington. August 5, 2020 (Zillow) — Areas of the 50 largest U.S. metros in which single-family, detached homes represent at least 90% of the housing stock are, on average, whiter and more segregated than areas with a more diverse supply of housing, according to a Zillow analysis of American Community Survey data. Households headed by a person of color are less likely to live in areas where single-family, detached homes represent the bulk of the local housing stock.
Among the nation’s 50 largest markets, the New York metro area is the most extreme case: while the metro is 47% white, the average neighborhood of single-family, detached homes is 74% white. Baltimore follows: The metro area overall is 57% white, but areas largely composed of single-family, detached homes are 82% white. Out West, the trend is similar, though less extreme: The San Francisco metro area is 40% white, while a majority of households (51%) in single-family, detached-home-dominant areas are white.
Among all metro areas nationwide analyzed by Zillow — large and small — Cleveland, Miss., is the U.S. housing market where neighborhoods dominated by single-family, detached homes are most exclusionary of households of color: While the area overall is 32% white, the average area in which the bulk of homes are single-family, detached is 75% white.
Homes in duplexes, triplexes and small to medium-sized multifamily buildings are often more affordable — and therefore likely more accessible — for groups that may likely afford less, have less savings or not have access to intergenerational wealth that would allow them to more readily afford a detached single-family home. In the New York metro, for example, the typical value of a home in a medium-sized building is 14% less than the typical local, single-family, detached house and a home in a small building is 25% less.
And in the San Francisco metro area the typical home in a triplex or fourplex is estimated to sell for 13% less than the typical home overall — while the typical home in a large building is 20% less, and 30% less in a small building. It’s a similar story for renters. In the New York City rental market, the typical renter household living in a home that isn’t a single-family, detached house spends 8% less on rent — with even larger savings around 17% for renters in apartment buildings with at least 20 units.
In Baltimore, households that rent a home in any 2+ unit property typically pay 9% less. In the San Francisco rental market, renters that opt for a duplex, triplex, or unit in a small-to-medium-sized apartment building can expect to typically save 18% on rent, compared to the cost of renting a single-family, detached house. Nationwide, when controlling for age, income, metro area, education and years spent living in this country, the odds are 14% higher that a household headed by a person of color rents rather than owns their home.
Because rental homes are generally more likely to be in multi-unit structures like apartment buildings (82% of homeowner households live in a single detached home, compared to only 27% of renter households), neighborhoods that prohibit or otherwise lack these more affordable home types are more likely to exclude households of color.
Methodology
Zillow analyzed five years of American Community Survey data (2014-2018) at the census block group level, comparing metro-level racial distributions and the average distribution of the census block groups therein. By reviewing the correlation between the home types that dominate various census block groups, and how racially exclusionary they are, our analysis revealed that block groups monopolized by at least 90% single-family detached houses corresponded with higher exclusion of households of color, on average. To reduce technical jargon, this analysis uses terms including “neighborhood” and “enclave” interchangeably when referring to the small areas represented by census block groups.
