Why does Build Indiana Roots use housing studies?
Think of it like this: You want to gauge how you are performing at work, but you are hesitant to do a self-assessment or ask for a 360 review. You want to lose weight, but you are afraid to step on the scale or take measurements. You want to improve your health, but you won’t let your doctor test your cholesterol or listen to your heart and lungs.
How will you know if you are moving the needle on your goals? More fundamentally, how will you even be able to identify roadblocks? Or chart a course to go from here to there if you don’t know where here is?
This is why Build Indiana Roots believes in housing studies.
3 Reasons Housing Studies Are Invaluable
At Build Indiana Roots, our mission is educating Hoosiers on achievable housing and advocating responsible, balanced housing policies. It is our belief that we can grow thriving, sustainable communities – together. Authoritative housing studies support our work and enable us to:
Provide Quantitative Data
Like the 360 review, the scale, or the results of your triglycerides test, housing studies provide us with quantitative data. These facts and figures help to define the problem and determine the scope. For example, the recent Common Sense Institute’s “Indianapolis Metropolitan Area Housing Affordability Report” finds that we have a deficit of between 18,852 – 61,238 housing units currently and that, by 2028, we’ll need to build between 66,000 – 115,000 new units to bridge the gap and accommodate anticipated population growth.
The data prompts us – forces us – to examine the issue, to identify the challenge, and to confront reality head-on. This is the only way that we can affect change.
Advocate for the “Missing Middle”
Of course, behind every fact and figure is a person, a family, a household desperately seeking adequate and achievable housing. People like Sarah and Koty Chapman, restaurant workers with a small child who saved, paid off debts, worked on their credit scores – and still found themselves losing the bidding wars on dozens of homes. Sarah was left wondering, “Am I even going to be able to live in my own community?”
This is a question asked again and again by millions of Hoosiers who are priced out of the market. While studies deliver the quantitative data we need, they also remind us that we’re not looking just at numbers. We are looking at the “missing middle.” The hospitality industry workers, the managers, the first responders, the teachers, the nurses, and others who form the backbone of our neighborhoods and local economies simply cannot afford to live in their own communities. Utilizing studies to help start the conversation objectively, we can help amplify their voice.
Further the Conversation – and Drive Change
The statistics underscoring the scope of the housing issue are nothing short of dire. But we go beyond the numbers. The studies help show us reality… Now what can we do about it? Solutions must be multifaceted and collaborative, and Build Indiana Roots strives to connect with builders, developers, policymakers, and community members to engage in meaningful discussion – and spur substantive action to advance achievable housing in the Hoosier State.
Join the Coalition
Authoritative housing studies are the starting point. They show us the here and help point out a way to get there in terms of achievable housing. Want to add your voice to the conversation? Learn more at https://buildindianaroots.com.