Lately, we have been bombarded with news about the soaring cost of housing in the City of Santa Barbara. We know that a one-bedroom apartment in the city averages $3,000/month, and the median home price in Santa Barbara as of August 2023 was $2.1 million. A 2018 Purdue University study rated our city as the most expensive place in the U.S. to “be happy,” but many of us are not happy with the cost of housing.
Given our climate and our many attractive amenities, housing has always been relatively expensive here, but now it has reached crisis level. The current costs put housing out of reach not just for essential service workers, police and firefighters, nurses, and teachers, but even for health-care professionals like young doctors.