How does the average Summit County family purchase a home or find a reasonably priced rental unit in a market saturated with luxury real estate?
The county government for years has focused on affordable housing, which the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development defines as discounted units for those making 80% of the area median income, or AMI.
But the 80% AMI mark in Summit County is well over $150,000, meaning affordable housing units can still feel out of reach for the local workforce. As a result, developers and county officials have now pivoted to focus on “attainable housing” — a more flexible version of affordable housing that does not need to meet strict federal guidelines.
Maddy McDonough, the executive director of the Summit County Housing Authority, said most workers in the county earn between 30% and 50% of the area median income. The 50% AMI mark is $84,300 for a family of four, which means it’s not possible to purchase “affordable” housing priced at the 80% AMI mark, especially when the median price of a home in Summit County is around $1.7 million.
McDonough said targeting a lower AMI is doable as long as the county doesn’t rely on federal funding for its housing projects. Otherwise, the county would need to adhere to the 80% AMI mark as mandated by the federal government.
“We’re working on a program to pilot vouchers, and that would be funded through the Housing Authority so we could target those lower AMIs,” McDonough said. “That could be in the form of rental assistance, either short term or long term. We’re working out the details of that program and are expecting to be able to launch the pilot in 2026.”
Jenn Lewis, who chairs the Housing Authority, said the department isn’t trying to “reinvent the wheel,” but it is studying other communities and successful programs to determine how best to serve middle class families along the Wasatch Back.
“What the Housing Authority is trying to do is add more programs to help people thrive here,” Lewis said. “It’s important that these families thrive here because they’re families that live here and help the community be better and to grow.”
Lewis and McDonough said they also thought referring to affordable units as attainable housing might appeal more to the Summit County community because of the negative stigma often associated with federal affordable housing projects.
“I used to work in housing a long time ago, and the stigma that we had to struggle with was that people would assume that if you’re on housing, you’re a criminal or a troublemaker or you’re going to bring property values down,” Lewis said. “There’s a stigma that this person is less of a human being because they need financial help.”
The Housing Authority meets at 10 a.m. on the third Wednesday of each month, and McDonough encouraged community members interested in attainable or affordable housing to attend the meetings to ask questions and further engage with local officials.