Americans are paying too high price to become a homeowners, Bloomberg writes. Borrowers spend half of their income on mortgages in some parts of the country.

As a result of combination of growing home prices and increasing interests rates together with lagging income, costs of mortgage payments accounted for 17,1% of average income in first quarter. This is the highest value since 2009. It was 15,9% during previous three months.

While wages just started to grow, home prices have been rising for some years. Average 30-year mortgage rate increased to 4,44% by the end of May. It was 3,95% in the beginning of this year. While home prices were growing, historically low mortgage rates saved the borrowers. Now the situation has changed.

The biggest problems with affordability can be observed at West Coast, including Silicon Valley, where borrowers spend more than half of their income on mortgages. For comparison, it accounts for 28% in New York metropolitan area and sounds quite reasonable.