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Everyone complains about how hard it is to find decent, affordable housing. But imagine how much more frustrating and futile that search would feel if you had to find decent housing that was not just affordable, but also accessible.
A recent report to Congress from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) notes that people with disabilities may have “additional difficulties in finding suitable housing at a reasonable cost because of a lack of accessible housing.” It notes that “features that are luxury amenities for some households, such as elevators, may be necessities for people with disabilities.”
I am one of the many disabled people who has encountered this problem. When I found the condo in which I have lived for more than thirty years, I had to hire someone before I could move in to modify the bathroom because I could not fit through the narrow door in my motorized wheelchair. I don’t believe anyone else among the hundreds of people who have lived in this building had to do that.
The HUD report draws on the 2023 American Housing Survey, which the U.S. Census Bureau has conducted every two years since 1973. The survey provides up-to-date information about the quality and cost of housing in the United States and major metropolitan areas.
Under the federal Fair Housing Act, all multi-family housing of four units or more built after March 13, 1991, must have an accessible building entrance on an accessible route; accessible public and common-use areas; doors, doorways, kitchens, and bathrooms that are usable by a person in a wheelchair; an accessible route into and through the dwelling unit; light switches, electrical outlets, thermostats, and other environmental controls in an accessible location; and reinforced walls in bathrooms for the future installation of grab bars.
This includes housing that is for rent or for sale, and applies whether the housing is privately or publicly funded. Condos and apartment buildings are covered by the design and construction requirements; so are time-shares, dormitories, transitional housing, student housing, assisted living housing, and some homeless shelters. And the internal design standards apply to all of the units in buildings that have an elevator, but only to the ground-floor units in buildings without an elevator.
But all housing that went up before that date is under no federal legal obligation to be accessible. Neither are buildings that have fewer than four housing units. My building is accessible enough for me only by accident. It opened in 1911, but it has a flat entrance and there are three elevators in the lobby.
In other words, I got lucky. There isn’t a lot of housing out there that is both accessible and affordable. New housing still goes up every day that has steps leading to the entrance or other barriers that shut out people with disabilities, including many single-family homes.
People with disabilities shouldn’t have to get lucky to find a place they can live.