A household needs an income of $459,600 to affordably buy a median-priced single-family home in Newport, where that price reached $1,510,000 last year, according to the 2026 Housing Fact Book released Friday by HousingWorks RI at Roger Williams University.
Newport’s median household income is $86,313.
The city’s median single-family price rose 94% between 2020 and the end of 2025, when the Fact Book’s data ends, from $779,609 to $1,510,000. More recent weekly sales reports have described a slower fall market across Newport County.
Average rent for a two-bedroom apartment reached $2,194, up 19% over the same period. The income needed to afford that rent — $87,743 — is slightly more than the city’s median household income.
The median sale price reflects what homes sold for, not what most residents paid. Newport’s for-sale market draws heavily from outside buyers and second-home purchasers, and most current owners bought years earlier at far lower prices. The affordability figures describe what it would take to enter the market now.
How that number is calculated
The $459,600 figure comes from a standard model, not from any particular buyer’s situation.
HousingWorks RI starts with Newport’s 2025 median single-family sale price of $1,510,000 and builds a monthly payment around it: a 3.5% down payment, a 30-year mortgage at 6.6% — the 2025 average rate reported by Freddie Mac — plus Newport’s 2025 property tax rate, estimated hazard insurance, and FHA mortgage insurance of 0.55% a month with a 1.75% upfront fee financed into the loan.
That produces a monthly housing payment of $11,490, or $137,880 a year.
The report then applies the federal standard that a household should spend no more than 30% of its income on housing. Divide $137,880 by 0.30 and you get $459,600 — the income at which that payment would consume exactly 30%.
The same method produces the rent figures. Newport’s average two-bedroom rent of $2,194 a month, including utilities, works out to $26,328 a year; at 30% of income, that requires $87,743.
Two assumptions are worth understanding. The model uses a 3.5% down payment, so a buyer putting down 20% would need less income. And it excludes homestead exemptions, which reduce property taxes for owner-occupants in communities that offer them. The model uses the same assumptions for every municipality so the figures can be compared, rather than reflecting the financing an individual buyer would obtain.
Cost burden in Newport
Of Newport’s 11,049 households, 4,762 are cost burdened, meaning they spend 30% or more of their income on housing. That includes 55% of renter households and 33% of owner households. The city is evenly split between owners and renters.
Newport issued 12 building permits for new homes in 2025, all single-family, six of them accessory dwelling units.
Across Newport County
The annual income needed to afford a median-priced single-family home:
| Community | Income needed |
|---|---|
| Newport | $459,600 |
| Jamestown | $307,186 |
| Little Compton | $288,451 |
| Portsmouth | $241,584 |
| Middletown | $231,824 |
| Tiverton | $161,650 |
Statewide, the figure is close to $130,000 — more than $40,000 above Rhode Island’s median household income of $87,796.
To rent an average two-bedroom apartment, a household needs $97,303 in Portsmouth, $95,503 in Middletown, $87,743 in Newport and $85,823 in Tiverton. Jamestown and Little Compton had too few rentals to calculate.
Affordable housing stock
State law sets a goal of 10% of a municipality’s housing being low- and moderate-income. Newport is one of a handful of Rhode Island communities to have met it, at 16.31%.
The rest of the county has not. Portsmouth is at 3.34% and would need 510 more units to reach the threshold — the largest shortfall in the county. Middletown is at 6.74%, needing 245 units; Tiverton at 6.05%, needing 296; Jamestown at 4.73%, needing 138; and Little Compton at 0.65%, needing 159. Little Compton’s share is the lowest in the state.
The region
HousingWorks RI groups Newport County with Bristol, Barrington and Warren as the Southeast region, with 135,569 residents and 56,973 households. The region’s median home price is $700,000, which only 16% of its households — 9,365 — can afford.
Statewide findings
A third of Rhode Island households, 148,766, are cost burdened, and 65,649 of those are severely cost burdened, paying at least half their income toward housing. Forty-eight percent of renter households statewide are cost burdened, rising to 80% among the lowest-income renters.
Homelessness fell 6% from 2025 to 2026 in the federal point-in-time count, but remains more than double the 2019 level, with unsheltered homelessness nearly seven times higher. Student homelessness reached a record 1,994 in the 2024-25 school year.
“Despite recent progress at the state level, Rhode Island continues to underinvest in state spending on housing and homelessness relative to our neighboring states,” said Brenda Clement, the organization’s executive director. Rhode Island spends $25.18 per capita, fourth among the six New England states, compared with $150.07 in Connecticut and $204.05 in Massachusetts, according to the report.
HousingWorks RI is also urging passage of Question 2, the housing bond on the Nov. 3 statewide ballot. The full report is at housingworksri.org.
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