Striking a balance: Affordable housing need persists as number of high-income households rises

In the same week as the City of Fort Wayne is requesting public input for their Consolidated Plan for the next five years, where the number one goal is creating and preserving affordable housing, the Summit City ranked 21st among U.S. cities with the highest growth rate of high-income households.

The ranking was released by SmartAsset on Thursday, comparing U.S. census data from 2023 and 2024. In that time, Fort Wayne went from having 4,262 high-income households in 2023 to 6,619 in 2024, a nearly 60% increase. Though Director of the Purdue Fort Wayne Community Research Institute, Rachel Blakeman, pointed out the percentage increase is a high figure because Fort Wayne didn’t have a high percentage of high-income households to begin with. In 2023, 3.7% of all Fort Wayne households were considered high income. In 2024, that percentage rose to 5.9%. Blakeman said that growth is good.

The problem is that when we look at this number, we’re still at about 6% or less of households making $200,000 or more,” Blakeman said. “So, if you’re sort of feeling, ‘Hey, I’m not part of that,’ you’re in the vast majority.”

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