Category: Cost of Living
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Rent and housing costs keep climbing near 3.2 percent a year
Housing remains the most stubborn piece of the inflation picture, with shelter costs climbing near 3.2 percent a year — faster than overall inflation and by far the largest line in most household budgets. For renters and homeowners alike, that steady rise is why the cost of living still feels tight even as prices for…
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Grocery prices are running about 2.7 percent higher than a year ago even as overall inflation cools
Grocery prices are running about 2.7 percent higher than a year ago, a pace that has held steady for months even as overall inflation cools. That is slower than the painful spikes of a few years back, but it is still a real squeeze at the checkout, and it lands hardest on households that spend…
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HUD just cut how much rent two voucher programs will cover, and agencies have 60 days to comply
Housing agencies across the country are working against a deadline that lands in the first half of October. It was set on August 10, when HUD issued a four-page notice to every public housing agency that runs a voucher program, giving them 60 days to bring two special voucher programs back inside a rent ceiling…
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HUD is auctioning $465 million of reverse mortgages on homes where the owner died and no heir stepped forward
A three-page notice filed in the Federal Register on August 10 carries a docket number, a bid window, and a dollar figure that stands in for roughly 1,500 American houses. The document is the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s second announcement of a loan sale it calls HNVLS 2026-1, and the loans inside it…
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California is putting $894 million of credits on power bills this year, worth up to $49.36 a household
The California Climate Credit reaches a household by subtraction rather than by application. Money raised when large emitters buy allowances under the state’s Cap-and-Invest Program is routed back to residential utility customers as a line item on the bill, applied by the utility without a form, an income test, or an enrollment window. In 2026…
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Beef costs 11.8 percent more than a year ago, and the cattle herd is the smallest in 75 years
Beef and veal cost 11.8 percent more in June 2026 than in June 2025. Over the same twelve months, retail egg prices fell 27.9 percent and poultry finished 0.1 percent lower than where it started. Those numbers come out of the same USDA report, on the same page, measured the same way, and the distance…
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Renters at apartments that used RealPage software since 2018 can claim part of a $359 million settlement
Three dates now govern this settlement, and only one of them is comfortably far off. September 1, 2026 is the deadline to opt out of the class or to file an objection. October 15, 2026 is the fairness hearing at which a federal judge in Nashville will decide whether to grant final approval. January 29,…
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Soda and candy stop ringing up on EBT cards in 18 states
The group affected here is easy to draw a line around: anyone paying with a SNAP EBT card in one of the 18 states whose federal food-restriction waiver is still standing. Eight of those states already run the restriction at the checkout lane. The other ten switch on between the last day of this month…
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Quartz countertops now face a four-year import quota that took effect August 15
At 12:01 a.m. Eastern time on August 15, a tariff-rate quota took effect on imported quartz surface products, the engineered slabs that reach American homes as kitchen counters, vanity tops and shower surrounds. It was created by Proclamation 11051, signed on July 31, 2026 and published in the Federal Register on August 5. The measure…
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Asking rent hit $1,962 and a household now needs $78,488 a year to afford the typical rental
Comfortably affording the typical U.S. rental takes $78,488 in annual income. Affording the typical mortgage payment takes nearly $99,800. Zillow published both estimates in its July rental report on August 18, and the distance between them, more than $21,000, is the company’s own explanation for why demand for rentals has not softened even after the…
