Tell us your story
We want to know how northern Michigan's housing crisis is affecting you. Can't find a place? Getting priced out of the area? Something else? Let us know.
As northern Michigan continues to grow, officials say a lack of housing will continue to put up barriers for people trying to move here and force neighbors out — people like Robin Harper.
She lives in a two-story apartment not far from Cherry Capital Airport. She’s playing some chill music on her TV as she describes the layout.
“Upstairs is where my bedroom, spare bedroom and the utility room are at,” Harper said as she walked up the stairs. “One bathroom up there — full bath but unexciting. In my old house, I had more square footage in my bathroom than these two combined, which was hard to get used to.”
Her old house was in Beulah, a countryside cabin she decided to sell in 2021 to try to take advantage of the inflamed market.
But getting a new place closer to Traverse City, where she works, was not easy. She remembers that year as one of the most stressful times of her life.
Harper works as a receptionist at a cancer clinic. Her company provides its new employees with a list of available rentals in the area when they’re in a pinch.
She remembers going through the list with her friends and laughing at what they saw.
“I didn't even make it through the whole list but there's some fun stuff in here,” she said, flipping through the pages. “A lot of them are seasonal … one bedroom (apartments) for $2,000.”
She found her current apartment in a Craigslist advertisement. When she signed the lease, her rent was just under $1,000. She said it was in her budget at the time.
But now, Harper said her rent has increased more than 20 percent in the past two years. She pulls a little from her savings account each month. And she misses her old house in the countryside with every bill.
Harper said her rent has increased more than 20 percent in the past two years. She pulls a little from her savings account each month. And she misses her old house in the countryside with every bill.
“I'd come home from work and play out in the yard or sit on the back deck and have a cocktail or two or bonfires. I have none of that here,” she said.
The bigger picture
Stories like Harper’s are the reality of what experts say is a serious issue for northern Michigan's tourism-based economy: As rental prices continue to climb, service-sector employees continue to be priced out.
According to the latest data from Housing North, nearly two-thirds of rental units in Traverse City have rents between $750 and $1,500. That’s a higher portion compared to the rest of Grand Traverse County, the rest of northern Michigan, and the rest of the state.
But many people simply can’t afford those prices. Experts say it’s been that way since the 2008 recession. As far back as 2012, a report called the Grand Traverse County Housing Inventory and Strategy, found regional families are spending huge chunks of their budgets on housing.
“I don't see this problem being solved. anytime soon, given the system that we have,” said Michael Broadway, a human geography researcher at Northern Michigan University.
Broadway mainly studies migration trends in the Upper Peninsula but keeps an eye on state and national trends too. Housing data from Realtor.com say the average home price in Grand Traverse County has gone up nearly $100,000 in the past three years.
Broadway said unlike other industries following the COVID-19 pandemic, housing costs don’t seem to be falling to pre-pandemic levels.
“There was the perception that there was a shortage of red meat. So, the price of steaks went up and ground beef went up. And eventually, it came down,” Broadway said. “But housing costs don't appear to follow that same trajectory.”
Michigan’s minimum wage is scheduled to increasein 2024. But only from $10.10 to $10.33 per hour. There’s a fight to increase it even more in the state supreme court.
But even that effort is far below Michigan’s living wage, the pay needed to support one person working full time. That’s estimated to be $16.27 an hour.
Broadway said until people make that much, there will be people like Robin Harper who get priced out.
“Some people will say, 'Well, Robin, you better go back to school and try to become a doctor,' right? I mean, you can't tell that to people, can you?” he said.
Working on it
Meanwhile, advocates in the region are shifting their focus to solutions.
“We need housing, for everybody at a variety of price points, so people like Robin can find something that is suitable and not feel so desperate,” said Yarrow Brown, executive director of Housing North which advocates for housing solutions across a ten-county region. “Any way we can encourage affordability that's locked in for a term is extremely important.”
Brown said one approach is tax credits that make it so developers don’t have to pay taxes for a set amount of years in order to keep rents low.
There’s even a new state lawthat makes it easier for cities to approve projects that offer rentals to people who earn too much to qualify for help, but too little to afford rent - the so-called “missing middle.”
“The numbers are really stark, and it is going to take some drastic changes, accepting of these tools, and even units of government stepping into the space, maybe where they haven't before.”
Yarrow Brown
Housing North
In communities like Garfield Township, payment-in-lieu-of taxes programs were already grantedto some developments.
Brown said these incentives have a lot of promise, especially in Traverse City’s red-hot rental market.
However, rentals are only part of the puzzle. Experts say sustainable solutions to the housing crisis will take creativity.
“It is doom-and-gloom right now,” Brown said. “The numbers are really stark, and it is going to take some drastic changes, accepting of these tools, and even units of government stepping into the space, maybe where they haven't before.”
Running out of time
Harper said those changes need to come fast. Her art supplies are still in boxes because she doesn’t know where she’ll be next year.
She worries that if her rent goes up again, she’ll need to find somewhere else to live and she’s not sure if Traverse City is worth fighting for.
“I don't have government funding from anywhere. I don't have a spouse giving me half the rent, you know, and I don't want a roommate,” Harper said. “Unless you can talk my employer into doubling my wages or you know, giving me a severe increase, I mean, there's just no way.”
