Howard County Housing Affordability Coalition

Housing Dashboard

Data as of October 5, 2026

Howard County housing, in one place.

Prices, what it takes to buy, the affordability gap, who carries the cost burden, and how that burden falls unevenly by race and ethnicity — the data our Coalition uses to make the case for more affordable homes.

Key Metrics at a Glance

The median sold price for a Howard County home was $639,000 in August 2026, and a two-bedroom apartment runs $1,947–$3,069 a month.

For Sale: Median Sold Price
$639,000
HCAR / Bright MLS · August 2026 closed sales
For Rent: 2BR Monthly Range
$1,947–$3,069
HCHC payment standards, effective Jan 1, 2026

What It Takes to Buy the Median-Priced Home

A single 10% down-payment scenario, using HCAR's August 2026 median sold price and the displayed Freddie Mac 30-year fixed rate.

Down payment of 10%
$63,900
Annual income required
$209,550

to afford a home at Howard County's median sold price — assuming 10% down, a 30-year fixed mortgage at 7.28%, PMI of ~0.55% on the loan, and housing costs at 28% of gross income.

Monthly housing cost breakdown
Principal & interest$3,935
Property tax (1.014%)$540
Homeowners insurance$150
PMI (~0.55% of loan)$264
Total monthly housing cost$4,889
Cash needed to close is roughly $83,070 — a $63,900 down payment plus about $19,170 in closing costs (title, transfer, recordation, and lender fees at ~3% of price).
From the Comptroller of Maryland: Howard County is among the least affordable counties in Maryland for first-time homebuyers, with home prices well above the statewide median and monthly ownership costs among the highest in the state.

What It Takes to Rent an Average Apartment

The same question from the renter's side: the household income needed to afford an average Howard County apartment without spending more than 30% of income on housing.

Average two-bedroom, rent plus utilities
$2,269/mo
Annual income required
$90,760

to rent the average two-bedroom — $2,055 in rent plus $214 in tenant-paid utilities — while keeping housing at 30% of gross income. That is 75% of the area median income. A three-bedroom takes $114,400, or 94% of the area median.

1 BR2 BR3 BR
Average rent$1,761$2,055$2,623
Tenant-paid utilities$205$214$237
Gross monthly rent$1,966$2,269$2,860

Based on 10,223 one-bedroom, 12,849 two-bedroom and 1,964 three-bedroom apartments in the surveyed inventory.

The median Howard County renter household earns $95,055 — enough for an average one- or two-bedroom, but $19,345 short of an average three-bedroom. Howard County has the highest median renter income in the region, and a family-sized apartment is still out of reach for a renter at the middle.

What Howard County Jobs Pay

Average annual wage by sector, against the $78,640 a one-bedroom requires

Average wage below the income a one-bedroom needs At or above it
Five of the county's eleven employment sectors pay an average wage below the $78,640 a one-bedroom requires — including Education and Health at $58,443, the sector that covers teachers, nurses and home health aides. Leisure and Hospitality averages $26,368, about a third of what a one-bedroom takes. A single average wage is not a household income, but it shows which kinds of work cannot reach an average rent on one paycheck.

Prices & Homeownership by Community

Howard County is not one housing market. Prices and ownership rates vary sharply across its communities.

Median Listing Prices by Community

Asking prices across Howard County communities, separate from the HCAR sold-price headline

Homeownership Rate by Community

Share of occupied homes that are owner-occupied, by Census-designated place

Gap in Affordable Rental Housing by Income Level

Is this housing market producing enough rental homes for each income band?
AMI = area median income

Households in this income band (demand) Rental homes affordable at this income level (supply)
Across the three bands below 60% AMI, 12,627 renter households are chasing just 4,518 affordable homes — a shortage of 8,109 homes, or roughly one affordable home for every three households that need one. Above 60% AMI the picture reverses for the moderate- and high-rent bands, then flips back to a shortage for the highest-earning renters.

Housing Cost Burdens for Renters and Homeowners

A household is cost-burdened if it spends more than 30% of gross income on housing costs.

Renter Cost Burden

47.7% of renters are cost-burdened (~15,981 households)

Universe: 33,503 renter households paying cash rent.

Owner Cost Burden (w/ Mortgage)

21.7% of owners with mortgages are cost-burdened (~13,510 households)

Universe: 62,295 owner households with a mortgage.

Nearly half of Howard County renters — about 16,000 households — spend more than 30% of gross income on housing, more than double the rate among homeowners with a mortgage.

Housing Cost Burdens by Race & Ethnicity

The same cost burden falls unevenly across Howard County households.

Moderate (30–50% of income) Severe (>50% of income)

Renter Cost Burden by Race & Ethnicity

Homeowner Cost Burden by Race & Ethnicity

All owner-occupied households, with or without a mortgage.

Among renters, 57% of Hispanic or Latino households are cost-burdened (1,535 of 2,680), compared with 35% of White non-Hispanic households — a 22-point gap. Among homeowners, Black households are burdened at 24% (2,830 of 11,815) versus 15% for White non-Hispanic households.

Renting on a Disability Income

About 28,952 Howard County residents live with a disability — 8.7% of the population, and 24.2% of those aged 65 and over. For the 3,881 residents whose income is a federal disability check rather than a paycheck, the distance between income and rent is the widest gap on this dashboard.

Maximum monthly SSI benefit, 2026
$994/mo
Monthly shortfall on an average one-bedroom
$1,668

Holding rent to the standard 30% of income leaves $298 a month out of a full SSI check. An average Howard County one-bedroom costs $1,966 including tenant-paid utilities. The rent alone is 198% of the entire benefit — before food, medicine or transportation.

SSI is the federal benefit for people with disabilities who have almost no income or assets. Maryland adds a state supplement only in licensed care homes and assisted-living settings — not for someone renting an apartment on their own.

The Technical Assistance Collaborative's Priced Out analysis puts a one-bedroom at 152% of SSI across the Baltimore-Columbia-Towson metro area and 168% statewide. Howard County comes out higher — 198% — because county rents run above the metro-wide average the national study uses. And $994 is the maximum: the average SSI payment actually received in Maryland is $718.98, which would put an average one-bedroom at 273% of income.

Earnings, Not Just Benefits

Annual income by source, against the $78,640 a one-bedroom requires

Below the income a one-bedroom needs At or above it
Most people with disabilities are not living on SSI — but working does not close the gap either. Median earnings for a Howard County worker with a disability are $51,315, about 65 cents for every dollar earned by a worker without one, and $27,325 short of the income an average one-bedroom takes. Workers without a disability clear that bar by $903. Poverty runs 12.6% among residents with a disability against 4.5% without.
Because no wage or benefit at these levels reaches an average rent, subsidy is the only bridge — and it is scarce. Maryland reported roughly 4,000 people waiting for affordable, accessible housing in FY2025 against a statewide Section 811 portfolio of 319 units. Howard County's own recent additions are counted in the dozens: 19 units at Patuxent Commons, 9 at Robinson Overlook and 6 at The Marlow. The Housing Commission's Housing Choice Voucher waiting list is closed.

Moderate Income Housing Unit (MIHU) Program

Howard County's inclusionary zoning program. Developers in designated zoning districts must sell or rent a share of new units to moderate-income households at prices and rents the County sets — and those restrictions run in perpetuity.

MIHU Home vs. Market
45% below
$348,017 average new MIHU townhome vs. $628,000 market median
MIHU Rent vs. Market
25% below
$1,488 average MIHU rent vs. $1,979 countywide market average
Eligible Buyers Served
1 in 10
45 of 426 income-eligible applicants, calendar year 2024
Rental MIHUs in Service
1,005
Across 30 rental communities, calendar year 2025

How the Two Tracks Work

For Homebuyers

Income limit≤80% AMI
Max income, family of four$117,586
Average new MIHU townhome$348,017
Average MIHU resale$306,940
Affordability termPerpetual

Prices are set twice yearly at what a household earning 70% of median can afford for a single-family or proffered home, 65% for a townhouse, and 50% for a condominium. On resale, the price may rise only by the change in consumer prices or median income, whichever is lower, capped at 3.5% a year. Enrollment opens quarterly and applications stay valid three years.

For Renters

Income limit≤60% AMI
Max income, family of four$88,189
Average MIHU rent$1,488
Typical 2BR MIHU rent$1,456–$1,507
Affordability termPerpetual

Rents are capped at 30% of the monthly income of a household at 60% of median, and must include a utility allowance. There is no county waiting list — renters apply directly to a participating community on a first-come, first-served basis, and income is recertified each year at lease renewal.

What MIHU Saves a Household

Purchase price, MIHU vs. market

Monthly rent, MIHU vs. market

On both tracks the discount is real and deep. A MIHU townhome costs roughly $280,000 less than the county's median home, and a MIHU rent runs about $490 a month less than the countywide average — roughly $5,900 a year back in a renter's pocket.

Who Actually Gets In

Income-eligible homebuyer applicants compared with homes actually awarded

Income-eligible applicants Homes awarded

Calendar-year figures from the County's statutory MIHU Annual Analysis. Percentages are awarded homes as a share of income-eligible applicants.

The County states it plainly: of the 471 households that applied for a MIHU home in 2024, 45 were awarded one — about 1 in 10 applicants. In 2025 the ratio fell to 15 of 382 income-eligible applicants, under 1 in 25.

For-Sale MIHUs Awarded by Fiscal Year

Homes awarded to first-time homebuyers

Supply is shrinking while prices climb. For-sale awards fell from 50 in FY2024 to 16 in FY2026, a 68% drop in two years. Over the same period the average new MIHU townhome rose 15% and the average MIHU rent rose 19%. Across 2018–2025 the program awarded 287 homes — about 36 a year against an estimated countywide shortfall of roughly 20,000 affordable units.

Homelessness: The Path Home

Howard County's homelessness data comes from the Coalition to End Homelessness, the county's HUD-designated Continuum of Care (CoC MD-504). Each January the CoC counts everyone sleeping in a shelter or outside on a single night — the point-in-time count. The County's five-year plan, adopted in November 2025 and now called The Path Home, aims to make homelessness “rare, brief, and non-recurring” by 2030.

2025 Point-in-Time Count
147
People counted on the night of January 28, 2025 — up from 130 a year earlier
Sleeping Unsheltered
51
35% of the count, down from 62 in 2024
Average Time Homeless
163 days
Federal FY2024 — the highest in the ten years HUD has published
Entries Over Exits, FY2025
+107
294 people entered the county system, 187 left it

Who Was Counted, and Where They Slept

Point-in-time count by shelter status, 2015–2025

Sheltered Unsheltered 2021: sheltered only — no unsheltered count

* In 2021 HUD let communities cancel the unsheltered half of the count because of COVID-19 transmission risk, and Howard County did. That bar is hatched because it records sheltered residents only; it is not comparable with the years on either side, and the low figure also reflects the eviction moratorium and pandemic rental aid then in place. The 2022 count was taken late, on February 15.

The sharpest disparity in the county's homelessness data is who experiences it. African American residents are 21% of Howard County's population but 59% of everyone counted in the point-in-time count. White residents are 24% of the count, and 11% are another race or multiracial.

More People Entering Than Leaving

Entries into and exits from the county homeless system, fiscal years 2021–2025

Entered the system Exited the system

County fiscal years run July to June, so FY2025 covers July 2024 through June 2025. Entries have fallen every year since FY2022 and exits are at a five-year high, but the gap between them has not closed.

The plan defines its goal as functional zero — homelessness that is rare, brief and non-recurring — by 2030, and it does the arithmetic on what that takes. In FY2025 the county would have had to keep about 100 more people from becoming homeless, or move 100 more households into permanent housing, simply to bring entries and exits into balance. Roughly 960 residents were active in county homeless programs that year.

Methodology & Sources

How every figure on this dashboard is calculated, and where it comes from.

Median sold price, not asking price

Key Metrics and homebuying use the Howard County Association of REALTORS® (HCAR) monthly median sold price, based on Bright MLS closed sales across the report's property types. This is the overall monthly median, not the average or year-to-date price. HCAR replaced Realtor.com for these sections on September 15, 2026; the switch from asking prices to closed-sale prices is a change in definition, not a measured market decline. The By Community chart retains its separately dated Realtor.com listing-price series and county reference, not HCAR sold prices.

Mortgage cost assumptions

10% down on a 30-year fixed loan at the displayed Freddie Mac PMMS rate, subject to the refresh threshold below; property tax at the 1.014% effective combined county and state rate; homeowners insurance at $150/month; PMI at ~0.55% of the loan annually. Income required is the total monthly cost at a 28% front-end debt-to-income ratio.

The 198% disability figure is ours, not TAC's

The national Priced Out study reports one-bedroom rent as a share of SSI income for metro areas, not for Howard County. The 198% shown here is calculated for this dashboard by dividing the county's own surveyed gross one-bedroom rent by the 2026 SSI federal benefit rate. TAC's published metro figure, 152%, is shown alongside it so readers can see both.

Two different disability populations

The disability section compares two groups that do not overlap neatly. SSI recipients (3,881 in Howard County) are a small, very low-income subset. The earnings and poverty figures cover the far larger population of about 28,952 residents with a disability, and report individual earnings rather than household income.

Rent benchmark

The two-bedroom rent range uses Howard County Housing Commission Housing Choice Voucher payment standards rather than asking-rent estimates, because payment standards are an official, citable county benchmark set by bedroom count and ZIP code.

Income needed to rent

Average rents by bedroom size are calculated for this dashboard from Table 24, page 31 of the 2024 Howard County Rental Survey, weighting the report's Upper Tier and Balance of Market rents by unit counts; the method reproduces the report's own countywide average to within $1. Because the survey reports effective rent, the tenant-paid utility allowance from its Table 23 is added to reach gross rent, matching the affordability standard used elsewhere on this page. These are apartment rents only — scattered-site single-family rentals are excluded and rent higher. The survey is a November 2023 field survey and does not change with the monthly refresh.

Affordable rental gap

Taken verbatim from Table 64, “Penetration Rate Analysis,” page 93 of the 2024 Howard County Rental Survey. The report publishes supply, demand, and a penetration rate for each band; the shortage and surplus figures here are supply minus demand. The headline figure sums the three bands below 60% of area median income, which together represent the most deeply underserved renters.

MIHU program

Applicant, award, price, and rent figures come from the County's statutory MIHU Annual Analysis, which reports on a calendar-year basis. Award counts by fiscal year come from DHCD budget presentations. The two series are not interchangeable and are never combined in one chart. Rental inventory counts in County documents measure different things across years, so only the most recent count is shown rather than a trend.

Cost burden

A household is cost-burdened at more than 30% of gross income for housing, and severely burdened at more than 50%. Renter figures come from ACS Table B25070 and cover renter households paying cash rent; owner figures come from Table B25091 and cover owner households with a mortgage.

Race and ethnicity

Cost burden by race and ethnicity uses HUD CHAS tabulations of ACS microdata, which cross tenure and cost burden with the race and ethnicity of the householder — a breakdown the published ACS tables do not provide. Because the current CHAS release is built on ACS 2018–2022, that card runs two years behind the ACS 2020–2024 figures used elsewhere, and its homeowner series covers all owner-occupied households rather than only those with a mortgage.

Homelessness counts and fiscal years

Point-in-time figures are HUD's published counts for Continuum of Care MD-504. The count is a single-night census, so it measures how many people are homeless at one moment rather than over a year: HUD's annual records for federal FY2024 list 295 people, against a January count of 130. Two fiscal years appear in this card. HUD's system performance measures run October to September, and federal FY2024 is the most recent one published. The entry and exit figures come from The Path Home (the source PDF retains the original plan title) and run July to June, so its FY2025 is the county's. The plan also reports an average self-reported length of time unhoused of 245 days; that is a five-year average which counts time before someone contacts county services, and it is not comparable to HUD's 163-day measure. Because MD-504's counts run in the tens, year-to-year moves in small subgroups sit within methodological noise and are not charted here.

Refresh cadence

The HCAR median sold price and mortgage rate are reviewed on the 5th of each month. The latest available completed-month HCAR report is used; if a newer report has not yet appeared, the existing price and report month remain. The sold price is updated whenever it changes and is verified against HCAR's detailed and insight reports; the mortgage rate is updated when it has moved a quarter percentage point or more from the rate shown, so that the homebuying figures reflect meaningful shifts rather than week-to-week noise. The “data as of” date advances only when a figure changes. Community listing prices and their county reference are a separate, dated snapshot and do not change with the HCAR refresh. HCHC payment standards are reviewed each January, when new standards take effect. The point-in-time homeless count is checked every month and updated whenever HUD publishes a newer one; HUD's release timing is irregular — the 2025 count did not appear until May 2026 — so that check is not tied to a season. Census, CHAS, and Rental Housing Survey figures update when new releases are published.

Static figures

This dashboard is a static page. Every value, chart series, and citation is fixed at publication and changes only when the dashboard is rebuilt and republished.

Full Source List

Every source cited on this dashboard, grouped by the card it supports. Notes on calculation and data vintage are kept with each source.

Key Metrics at a Glance

  1. Howard County Association of REALTORS® (HCAR), August 2026 Detailed Report — overall median sold price $639,000; 329 closed sales. Data: Bright MLS; statistics calculated September 4, 2026. Verified against the August 2026 Local Market Insight Report. Retrieved September 15, 2026. New editions: HCAR Monthly Stats.
  2. Howard County Housing Commission, Housing Choice Voucher payment standards — effective January 1, 2026.

What It Takes to Buy the Median-Priced Home

  1. Home price: HCAR / Bright MLS, August 2026 median sold price, $639,000 (retrieved September 15, 2026). Loan amount $575,100 after 10% down.
  2. Rate: Freddie Mac PMMS 30-year fixed, 7.28% (week ending October 1, 2026), amortized over 360 months.
  3. Property tax: 1.014% effective combined Howard County and State of Maryland rate, per Howard County Department of Finance.
  4. Insurance: $150/month, typical Howard County estimate. PMI: ~0.55% of loan annually, required with less than 20% down.
  5. Income required: total monthly housing cost at a 28% front-end debt-to-income ratio.
  6. Affordability context: Comptroller of Maryland, Howard County affordability profile.

What It Takes to Rent an Average Apartment

  1. Rents: Real Property Research Group for the Howard County Housing Commission and the Department of Housing and Community Development, 2024 Howard County Rental Survey, Table 24, “Summary of Howard County Multifamily Rental Inventory,” page 31. Countywide averages here are calculated for this dashboard, weighting the report's Upper Tier and Balance of Market average effective rents by the unit counts in the same table. The result reproduces the report's own published countywide weighted average of $1,979 to within $1 — the $1 difference is because studio (159) and four-bedroom (111) units are excluded here. Linked from DHCD's Publications & Reports page.
  2. Data vintage. The survey is a November 2023 field survey (cover dated February 2024; the copy DHCD distributes is labeled June 2024). It is the most recent published countywide rent survey, but these rents are roughly three years old and current rents are likely higher. This card does not move with the monthly refresh that updates the homebuying figures above.
  3. These are apartment rents, not all rental housing. Table 24 covers the surveyed multifamily inventory of about 25,300 units. Scattered-site rentals — roughly 10,300 single-family homes, townhomes and condominiums, or about 28% of the county's 36,901 renter households — are excluded and rent higher, averaging $2,547 in the same survey.
  4. Utilities: the survey's “effective rent” is contract rent net of owner-paid utilities, with water, sewer and trash added back in. Reaching gross rent therefore requires adding the utilities a tenant pays directly. The allowances used here — $205 for one bedroom, $214 for two, $237 for three — are the survey's own figures from Table 23, page 29, and equal the all-electric total (heating, cooking, water heating and general electricity, excluding water, sewer and trash) in Table 25, “2023 Howard County Section 8 Utility Allowances,” page 33. All four bedroom sizes in Table 23 reconcile exactly to the Table 25 components.
  5. Affordability standard: a unit counts as affordable when gross rent (contract rent plus tenant-paid utilities) is 30% or less of gross household income — the same standard used in the Affordable Rental Gap and Cost Burden sections below. Income required is gross monthly rent × 12 ÷ 0.30.
  6. Area median income: HUD's 2023 median family income for the Baltimore-Columbia-Towson metro area, $121,700, as published in the survey's Table 23, page 29. Howard County is not a separate HUD income area.
  7. Median renter household income of $95,055 (and countywide median household income of $144,012): Esri 2024 estimates as reported in the 2024 Howard County Rental Survey, pages 4 and 21. Not a Census figure.
  8. Wages: average annual wage by sector, 2022, from the survey's “Average Annual Wage by Sector 2022” chart and Table 8, page 7, sourced to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages. Howard County's all-sector average wage that year was $82,016. These are 2022 wages compared against late-2023 rents; both come from the same report, and wages have since risen.

Prices & Homeownership by Community

  1. Median listing prices: Realtor.com place-level market trend pages for each community, e.g. Columbia, Ellicott City, Clarksville, retrieved July 31, 2026. County reference: Howard County, median listing price $657,475, retrieved September 5, 2026.
  2. Listing-price comparability: reporting months are not stated for every community, so the values may not reflect the same month. The county reference line and community bars both use Realtor.com listing prices. They are a separately dated snapshot, not the HCAR median sold price used in Key Metrics and homebuying; do not interpret the difference as a price change or a local sale-to-list ratio.
  3. Homeownership rates: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 2020–2024 5-Year Estimates, Table B25003 (tenure), for Howard County and its Census Designated Places. County average: 71.5%.
  4. Homeownership geography and sample size: Clarksville and West Friendship have no Census place record and cannot be charted; their ZIP-code areas (21029 and 21794) run 93.6% and 99.5%, but cover broader rural territory. Lisbon rests on just 29 occupied units, so read it as near-universal owner occupancy.

Gap in Affordable Rental Housing by Income Level

  1. Real Property Research Group for the Howard County Housing Commission and the Department of Housing and Community Development, 2024 Howard County Rental Survey, Table 64, “Penetration Rate Analysis,” page 93 (cover dated February 2024; the copy DHCD distributes is labeled June 2024). Demand is the table's “Estimated No. of Qualifying Renter Hhlds”; supply is its “Inventory Serving this Band.” Total renter households countywide: 36,901. Linked from DHCD's Publications & Reports page.
  2. The report publishes a penetration rate (supply ÷ demand), not a gap. The shortage and surplus figures shown here are supply minus demand, calculated from the table's own counts. The 12,627 / 4,518 / 8,109 sub-60% figures are the sum of the table's three lowest rows — the report's narrative gives slightly different totals in two places (4,479 units on page 92 and 4,519 in the executive summary), an inconsistency it does not reconcile.
  3. A unit counts as affordable when gross rent (contract rent plus tenant-paid utilities) is 30% or less of household income, using HUD's 2023 median family income of $121,700 for the Baltimore-Columbia-Towson metro area. Units are classified by their rent level across the whole surveyed stock — not by whether an income-qualified household actually occupies them. The report notes the high-rent surplus means those units are “serving renter households from other income bands.”
  4. Two limits the report states directly: the income bands overlap, because a band's floor is set by one-bedroom rents and its ceiling by three-bedroom rents, so a household can qualify for two bands depending on its size; and scattered-site rentals (10,300 of the 36,901 units) are modeled from a 13% sample rather than counted. The band inventory rows sum to 36,716 against a stated 36,901-unit universe, leaving 185 units unexplained.

Housing Cost Burdens for Renters and Homeowners

  1. U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 2020–2024 5-Year Estimates, Table B25070 — gross rent as a percentage of household income.
  2. U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 2020–2024 5-Year Estimates, Table B25091 — mortgage status by selected monthly owner costs as a percentage of household income.

Housing Cost Burdens by Race & Ethnicity

  1. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategy (CHAS) data, 2018–2022 release (published December 23, 2025), Table 9 — tenure by race and ethnicity of householder by cost burden, Howard County, Maryland (county-level CSV, GEOID 0500000US24027). Percentages are calculated from the published household counts; hover any bar for the underlying counts.
  2. Denominator is all households in each group, including the small number for whom cost burden was not computed (no or negative income). CHAS rounds household counts to the nearest 5, so shares carry roughly ±0.2 percentage points of rounding noise.
  3. Note on vintage: CHAS is built on ACS 2018–2022 5-year estimates, an earlier period than the ACS 2020–2024 estimates used in the countywide cost-burden card above. HUD has not yet released a CHAS edition based on 2020–2024 data, so the two cards are not directly comparable and the countywide totals differ slightly.

Renting on a Disability Income

  1. SSI benefit: the 2026 federal benefit rate for an eligible individual, $994 per month ($11,928 a year), from the Social Security Administration, SSI Federal Payment Amounts, effective January 2026. This is the maximum; countable income reduces it.
  2. Average payment actually received in Maryland, $718.98 (December 2025): SSA, SSI Annual Statistical Report, 2025, Table 11.
  3. Maryland's optional state supplement is paid only to people living in care homes, assisted living facilities and rehabilitative residences, and is not available to someone renting independently: SSA, State Assistance Programs for SSI Recipients — Maryland, and Maryland Department of Human Services, Public Assistance to Adults. Current-year supplement amounts are not published in a single place; the 2011 schedule is the most recent detailed table located.
  4. Howard County SSI recipients, 3,881 in December 2025 (1,299 aged; 2,582 blind and disabled; 550 under 18, 1,677 aged 18–64, 1,654 aged 65 and over): SSA, SSI Recipients by State and County, 2025, Table 3. County figures cover federally administered payments only. SSA does not publish a county average payment, and dividing county payments by recipients overstates it, so no county average is shown here.
  5. Rent: the $1,966 gross one-bedroom is the same figure used in the renting section above — $1,761 average effective rent plus $205 in tenant-paid utilities, calculated for this dashboard from the 2024 Howard County Rental Survey, Tables 23 and 24. It is a November 2023 field survey, so current rents are likely higher and the gap correspondingly wider.
  6. Comparison figures for the metro area and the state: Technical Assistance Collaborative, Priced Out, 2026 edition, which uses HUD's revised FY2026 Fair Market Rents as a proxy for local rents. TAC does not publish a Howard County row; the 198% figure on this page is calculated here from the county's own surveyed rent, and is not TAC's. TAC's finding is that there is “no United States housing market in which a person living solely on Supplemental Security Income (SSI) can afford a safe, decent apartment without rental assistance.”
  7. Disability population and age breakdown: Maryland Department of Planning, Howard County American Community Survey profile, ACS 2024 1-year, confirmed against Census table S1810. 28,952 of 334,399 civilian noninstitutionalized residents (±3,458).
  8. Median earnings and poverty by disability status: Census table S1811, ACS 2024 5-year — median earnings for the population 16 and over with earnings, $51,315 with a disability and $79,543 without; poverty 12.6% and 4.5%. The 1-year release of S1811 is not published for Howard County, so this is a five-year average and covers a different, much larger population than the SSI figures above. Earnings are individual earnings, not household income.
  9. Waiting list and Section 811 units: Maryland Department of Disabilities, State Disabilities Plan Progress Analysis, FY2025 Annual Report (November 2025), pages 6–7: “In Fiscal Year 2025, around 4,000 people were on the waitlist for affordable, accessible housing,” against 319 total Section 811 units statewide, 297 of them occupied. MDOD publishes program and waiting-list data but not income data for people with disabilities.
  10. Local units: Howard County, Patuxent Commons announcement (19 of 76 units for low-income residents with disabilities) and Howard County, August 2026 release (six accessible and affordable units at The Marlow, with an accessibility-prioritized wait list); Maryland DHCD, Robinson Overlook resident selection plan, page 2 (eight Section 811 units plus one Weinberg unit in Columbia). These are the units this dashboard could verify from published sources, not a county inventory — no countywide count of accessible affordable units is published. Voucher waiting list status: Howard County Housing Commission.
  11. This card does not move with the monthly refresh that updates the homebuying figures above. The SSI benefit changes each January; the ACS figures change annually.

Moderate Income Housing Unit (MIHU) Program

  1. Howard County Department of Housing and Community Development, MIHU program overview, MIHU Homeownership Program (buyer income limits effective January 1, 2026), and MIHU rental program (renter income limits effective January 1, 2026).
  2. Howard County DHCD, 2025 MIHU Annual Analysis — CY2025 applicants, eligibility, awards, average prices and rents, and rental inventory.
  3. Howard County DHCD, 2024 MIHU Annual Analysis — CY2024 applicants, eligibility, awards, and average prices and rents.
  4. Howard County, Who Can Afford to Buy a Home in Howard County — the County's own "about 1 in 10 applicants" statement.
  5. Howard County Code, Title 13, Subtitle 4 — § 13.403 pricing and rent formulas, § 13.404 resale price cap, § 13.405 perpetual rental restrictions, § 13.406 eligibility and priorities.
  6. Howard County DHCD, FY27 Budget Presentation (FY26 awards, 287 homes 2018–2025, perpetual affordability) and FY26 Budget Presentation (FY25 awards).
  7. Howard County, FY2025 Executive's Proposed Operating Budget — FY24 awards.
  8. Market comparisons: Redfin Howard County median sale price, $628,000 (May 2026); 2024 Howard County Rental Survey countywide average market rent of $1,979 and 2BR market average of $2,135.
  9. Unmet-need estimate of roughly 20,000 units: Housing Affordability Coalition comments on the draft Housing Opportunities Master Plan, September 14, 2021, citing the County's consultant study.
  10. Percentages comparing MIHU prices and rents with market figures, and shares of eligible applicants served, are calculated from the sourced values above. The purchase comparison is not a matched pair: the MIHU figure covers new townhomes in CY2025 while the market median covers all home types in May 2026.

Homelessness: The Path Home

  1. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 2007–2025 Point-in-Time Counts by CoC — the MD-504 sheltered and unsheltered series charted here, retrieved September 1, 2026.
  2. HUD CoC population and subpopulation reports for MD-504, which corroborate every annual total by shelter type — 2025 (147 total, 96 sheltered, 51 unsheltered, count taken January 28, 2025), 2024, and 2021, which prints an em dash in every unsheltered cell.
  3. HUD, CoC Performance Profile, MD-504, FY2024 — average length of time homeless of 163 days, median of 101 days, and HUD's statement of the 2021 unsheltered suppression.
  4. HUD, CoC System Performance Measures data since FY2015 — the FY2015–FY2024 series behind the ten-year comparison, and the annual count of 295 people cited in the Methodology note.
  5. Howard County, The Path Home. Underlying data remain from the PDF issued as The Path Toward Zero 2025–2030, adopted November 19, 2025 — system entries and exits, p. 20; the 100-person gap to functional zero, p. 20; 960 active participants, p. 22; the 59% and 21% racial comparison, p. 19; the functional-zero goal, p. 9; the 245-day self-reported average, p. 21.
  6. Howard County, Coalition to End Homelessness — Continuum of Care — CoC governance and the Division of Homeless Services as lead agency.
  7. Note on vintage: 2025 is the most recent point-in-time count HUD has published for MD-504, and federal FY2024 the most recent system performance measures; HUD has published no 2026 CoC-level count. The Coalition publishes no dashboard or annual report of its own, so all figures here are taken from HUD and from Howard County.

Used throughout the dashboard

  1. U.S. Census Bureau — American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates, Tables B19013 (median household income) and B25003 (tenure), used for the countywide context figures.
  2. U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development — FY2026 income limits, used to express income thresholds as a share of area median income.