click to enlarge Photo by Rob Bartlett

an overwhelmingly obvious affordable-housing crisis.



The

reported this past year that 45 percent of Orange County residents are renters with an average wage earning of $16.07. Orlando renters need to make at least $20 hourly wages to afford decent housing in Orange County.



If you plan on buying a home in Orlando, now is apparently the time. Forbes recently announced that Orlando is currently the best city in the nation to buy a home, due to prices increasing by 9 percent in 2017.Citing Local Market Monitor , a website that tracks housing markets, Forbes says home prices in Orlando are projected to increase by 35 percent over the next three years. This puts the City Beautiful at the No. 1 spot for home housing investments, followed by Provo-Orem, Utah, at No. 2 and Jacksonville, Florida, at the three.This study does fall in line with last quarter’s census figures, which put Orlando’s homeownership rate at 63 percent, up from 57 the year prior, reports the Orlando Sentinel The increase in the housing market could be thanks to the increase in the job market. As previously reported byOrlando led the state last year with the most jobs created, adding 39,500 new private-sector jobs in the last year for four months in a row.However, despite the increase in jobs, investing in Orlando housing is not geared towards locals with low-paying jobs and