'It's survival math every month': The rent crisis that got Zohran Mamdani elected goes far beyond New York City

By Charles Passy

The mayor-elect built his campaign around rent affordability. But the same issue applies across the country, according to experts - and the many people struggling to pay their rent each month.

Democratic New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani speaks during a campaign event in New York on Monday.

Zohran Mamdani, the 34-year-old democratic socialist who was just elected New York City's next mayor, built his campaign around making the Big Apple more affordable. And one of his major promises was a pledge to keep rents in check.

It's certainly an issue in the city, where the median asking rent is $3,491, according to data from Realtor.com. That translates into 55% of the typical household income. No doubt, that has left many residents invoking a saying from longtime New York political activist (and onetime mayoral candidate) Jimmy McMillan: "The rent is too damn high."

But New York is really a proxy for the rest of the nation: The rent burden has become particularly burdensome for many Americans, according to various sources.

Read more: Affordability is on the ballot, with voters under even more financial pressure than they were a year ago

Consider this: In 2023, 48.5% of renters were spending more than 30% of their monthly household income on rent, according to data from the State Health Access Data Assistance Center. That's the highest rate it's been in five years. (There is not more recent national data available, the center says.)

In effect, that means about half the renters in this country are facing a financial challenge, since the 30% figure is considered the safe threshold for keeping household budgets in check.

But for many renters throughout the country, getting to that 30% level seems like a distant dream.

Marissa Liberty, 48, is struggling to pay the $1,395 monthly rent on her Orlando, Fla., mobile home.

Marissa Liberty, a 48-year-old resident of Orlando, Fla., is currently unemployed - her last job contract ended unexpectedly early - and finding it nearly impossible to pay the $1,395 monthly rent on her mobile home as a result, she says. But what most disturbs Liberty, who's worked in the restaurant and medical fields, is that even if she finds a job, she believes she's not likely to earn more than around $20 an hour, based on what she's seen available locally.

That puts her well below the 30% mark, and worries her to no end. "I'd still struggle," she told MarketWatch.

Those in other parts of the country have much the same concerns.

Tyler Vaughan, a 25-year-old resident of Lancaster, Calif., works at a graphic-design company and makes $25 an hour. But that barely covers his $2,000-a-month rent, even with help from his parents. He also takes second jobs to help cover costs. But Vaughan almost considers himself lucky in that he's still able to pay his rent at all, unlike many young people he comes across.

"I generally don't know how half the people my age are doing it," he said.

It's no secret what's fueling this rent crisis, housing experts and professionals say: Wage growth hasn't kept pace with inflation, making it more difficult for Americans to afford any number of goods and services. Adding to that is the fact the housing market has been affected by an imbalance between supply and demand - and with the latter eclipsing the former, prices inevitably remain high.

'I generally don't know how half the people my age are doing it.'Tyler Vaughan, a 25-year-old resident of Lancaster, Calif., on dealing with the rent burden

The end result: Renters get caught in something of a no-win situation. They see their rents going up year after year, but as much as they want to move and lower their costs, they "know they'll have a hard time finding a different unit because of the limited supply," said Harrison Stevens, vice president of marketing at TurboTenant, a software company that specializes in the housing industry.

Shawn Zar, a real-estate investor based in Albuquerque, N.M., sees it firsthand, noting that most renters he knows spend close to half their income on housing.

"It's not just 'tight' anymore; it's survival math every month," he said.

So what do renters do? Many do indeed take on second jobs or find other ways to support themselves. And many find roommates.

But the math still gets tricky. An August 2025 survey from SpareRoom, a housing platform, found that 35% of those with roommates still had to borrow money from friends or family to pay their rent, while 28% relied on credit cards.

Moreover, it's not just young people fresh out of school who are rooming with others to keep their housing costs low.

Rany Burstein, founder and chief executive of Diggz, another housing platform, said that the fastest-growing segment of his company's users are older adults, as in those age 50 and up. That can include those who are recently divorced and realize they can't afford their own place, he explains, or those on fixed incomes who can't stretch their housing budgets any further.

Marsha Mitchell, a 53-year-old resident of Atlanta, is among those older Americans who have gone the roommate route. In order to afford her $3,000-a-month townhome, she's renting out space to others.

"I'm resourceful. I have to be," Mitchell said.

'I am on the verge of being homeless with my two cats and no place to go. I'm terrified.'Marissa Liberty, a 48-year-old resident of Orlando, Fla., who is struggling to pay rent.

Is there any solution to the rent crisis? It's not a question that can be answered easily, experts concur.

Mamdani's plan in New York - to lock in rents at their current rate for apartments that qualify under the city's rent-stabilization guidelines - can be an option elsewhere, of course.

But experts say that may only be a short-term fix. What's ultimately needed is more housing to change the supply-and-demand equation, many note.

For that to happen, municipalities need to ease restrictions on development, argues Colin Allen, executive director of the American Property Owners Alliance, a nonprofit group based in Washington, D.C. He says developers can't afford to see projects through to fruition if it's going to take years of working through red tape. That's especially the case when they're still contending with inflationary concerns and are uncertain how much materials may cost over the time period it takes to build housing.

At the same time, renters need better protection, according to Tara Raghuveer, director of the Tenant Union Federation, a national support organization. That includes rent regulation, but it goes beyond that. Ultimately, she said, housing must be "guaranteed as a public good," and she called upon federal, state and local governments to support renters through legislative means.

In the meantime, Liberty, the Orlando resident, is still trying to figure out how she'll make her future rent payments.

"I am on the verge of being homeless with my two cats and no place to go," she said. "I'm terrified."

-Charles Passy

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