How many hours of minimum wage does rent cost in your county?
A two-bedroom at HUD’s Fair Market Rent costs 251.7 hours of minimum-wage work a month in Santa Cruz County: #21 of 3,144 US counties and #1 in California.
A classic affordability rule says rent should cost no more than 30% of income. For a minimum-wage worker, a simpler measure is more concrete: how many hours of work does one month of rent take?
We divided HUD’s Fair Market Rent for every US county by the minimum wage that applies county-wide. For a two-bedroom, the median county needs 130.0 hours a month. A full-time job is about 173 hours a month. In 393 counties, rent alone takes more than a full-time month.
Source: HUD FY2027 Fair Market Rents, U.S. DOL state minimum wages · Data: rent.json · Code: rent-hours
Show the data (11 rows)
| Rank | County | 2BR FMR | Minimum wage | Hours per month |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rockingham County, NH | $2,289 | $7.25 | 315.7 |
| 2 | Hillsborough County, NH | $2,179 | $7.25 | 300.6 |
| 3 | Summit County, UT | $2,153 | $7.25 | 297.0 |
| 4 | Strafford County, NH | $2,093 | $7.25 | 288.7 |
| 5 | Beaufort County, SC | $2,010 | $7.25 | 277.2 |
| 6 | Berkeley County, SC | $1,884 | $7.25 | 259.9 |
| 6 | Charleston County, SC | $1,884 | $7.25 | 259.9 |
| 6 | Dorchester County, SC | $1,884 | $7.25 | 259.9 |
| 9 | Buncombe County, NC | $1,866 | $7.25 | 257.4 |
| 9 | Henderson County, NC | $1,866 | $7.25 | 257.4 |
| 21 | Santa Cruz County, CA | $4,254 | $16.90 | 251.7 |
The top of the list is mostly $7.25 states
All ten counties at the top of the two-bedroom ranking pay the $7.25 federal minimum, because their states have no higher one: three counties in New Hampshire, Summit County in Utah, four in South Carolina’s Lowcountry and two around Asheville, North Carolina. At #1, Rockingham County, NH needs 315.7 hours a month for a $2,289 two-bedroom.
These are not the most expensive rental markets in the country. They are places where rents have risen and the wage floor has not moved since 2009.
Santa Cruz: the highest rent in California, with a higher wage that doesn’t keep up
Santa Cruz County is different. Its minimum wage is California’s $16.90, more than double the federal floor, and it still ranks #21 nationally, because its two-bedroom Fair Market Rent is $4,254. That is the highest of California’s 58 counties, higher than San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin ($3,697).
Source: HUD FY2027 Fair Market Rents, U.S. DOL state minimum wages · Data: california-rent-hours.json · Code: rent-hours
Show the data (58 rows)
| County | 2BR FMR | Wage used | Hours | National rank | Hours at countywide local wage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Santa Cruz County | $4,254 | $16.90 | 251.7 | 21 | — |
| Marin County | $3,697 | $16.90 | 218.8 | 111 | — |
| San Francisco County | $3,697 | $16.90 | 218.8 | 111 | 188.5 ($19.61) |
| San Mateo County | $3,697 | $16.90 | 218.8 | 111 | — |
| Napa County | $3,375 | $16.90 | 199.7 | 178 | — |
| Santa Clara County | $3,272 | $16.90 | 193.6 | 213 | — |
| Santa Barbara County | $3,106 | $16.90 | 183.8 | 286 | — |
| Orange County | $3,057 | $16.90 | 180.9 | 312 | — |
| San Benito County | $3,004 | $16.90 | 177.8 | 333 | — |
| Los Angeles County | $2,964 | $16.90 | 175.4 | 364 | — |
| San Diego County | $2,823 | $16.90 | 167.0 | 465 | — |
| Sonoma County | $2,819 | $16.90 | 166.8 | 470 | — |
| Alameda County | $2,805 | $16.90 | 166.0 | 479 | — |
| Contra Costa County | $2,805 | $16.90 | 166.0 | 479 | — |
| San Luis Obispo County | $2,720 | $16.90 | 160.9 | 533 | — |
| Ventura County | $2,424 | $16.90 | 143.4 | 909 | — |
| Monterey County | $2,416 | $16.90 | 143.0 | 937 | — |
| Solano County | $2,342 | $16.90 | 138.6 | 1253 | — |
| El Dorado County | $2,201 | $16.90 | 130.2 | 1564 | — |
| Placer County | $2,201 | $16.90 | 130.2 | 1564 | — |
| Sacramento County | $2,201 | $16.90 | 130.2 | 1564 | — |
| Yolo County | $2,135 | $16.90 | 126.3 | 1707 | — |
| Riverside County | $2,103 | $16.90 | 124.4 | 1864 | — |
| San Bernardino County | $2,103 | $16.90 | 124.4 | 1864 | — |
| San Joaquin County | $2,015 | $16.90 | 119.2 | 1935 | — |
| Mono County | $1,927 | $16.90 | 114.0 | 2005 | — |
| Nevada County | $1,885 | $16.90 | 111.5 | 2032 | — |
| Stanislaus County | $1,803 | $16.90 | 106.7 | 2128 | — |
| Amador County | $1,765 | $16.90 | 104.4 | 2147 | — |
| Fresno County | $1,685 | $16.90 | 99.7 | 2200 | — |
| Mendocino County | $1,683 | $16.90 | 99.6 | 2202 | — |
| Kern County | $1,656 | $16.90 | 98.0 | 2229 | — |
| Lake County | $1,616 | $16.90 | 95.6 | 2260 | — |
| Tuolumne County | $1,603 | $16.90 | 94.9 | 2271 | — |
| Sutter County | $1,600 | $16.90 | 94.7 | 2278 | — |
| Yuba County | $1,600 | $16.90 | 94.7 | 2278 | — |
| Shasta County | $1,581 | $16.90 | 93.6 | 2297 | — |
| Humboldt County | $1,554 | $16.90 | 92.0 | 2320 | — |
| Calaveras County | $1,533 | $16.90 | 90.7 | 2373 | — |
| Alpine County | $1,526 | $16.90 | 90.3 | 2381 | — |
| Sierra County | $1,526 | $16.90 | 90.3 | 2381 | — |
| Merced County | $1,517 | $16.90 | 89.8 | 2405 | — |
| Kings County | $1,512 | $16.90 | 89.5 | 2416 | — |
| Butte County | $1,509 | $16.90 | 89.3 | 2419 | — |
| Mariposa County | $1,486 | $16.90 | 87.9 | 2476 | — |
| Inyo County | $1,465 | $16.90 | 86.7 | 2502 | — |
| Madera County | $1,460 | $16.90 | 86.4 | 2504 | — |
| Tulare County | $1,450 | $16.90 | 85.8 | 2510 | — |
| Plumas County | $1,422 | $16.90 | 84.1 | 2586 | — |
| Del Norte County | $1,406 | $16.90 | 83.2 | 2603 | — |
| Glenn County | $1,361 | $16.90 | 80.5 | 2684 | — |
| Tehama County | $1,361 | $16.90 | 80.5 | 2684 | — |
| Imperial County | $1,347 | $16.90 | 79.7 | 2694 | — |
| Colusa County | $1,344 | $16.90 | 79.5 | 2700 | — |
| Siskiyou County | $1,254 | $16.90 | 74.2 | 2772 | — |
| Lassen County | $1,248 | $16.90 | 73.8 | 2804 | — |
| Trinity County | $1,153 | $16.90 | 68.2 | 2899 | — |
| Modoc County | $1,084 | $16.90 | 64.1 | 3017 | — |
At 251.7 hours a month, a single minimum-wage earner would need to work 1.45 full-time jobs’ worth of hours, or 58.1 hours every week, to cover rent alone. That is 1.9× the median US county. Even a one-bedroom ($3,390) takes 200.6 hours, rank #88.
Santa Cruz County has no local minimum wage ordinance, so the state rate applies. San Francisco does have a city-county minimum wage ($19.61). At that rate its two-bedroom takes 188.5 hours instead of 218.8. The ranking above uses the state rate for every county, as the Rent Hours method does; the data table shows both.
Check your county
Rent Hours maps every county and metro area, for studios through four-bedrooms, and lets you swap the wage for the highest local minimum, the county’s median household income or any wage you type in.
Methods
- Rent. HUD FY2027 Fair Market Rents: gross rent including utilities at the 40th percentile of recent movers, by bedroom count. New England town-level FMRs are population-weighted to counties.
- Wage. The minimum wage that applies county-wide: the state or regional statutory rate, never below the $7.25 federal floor (U.S. DOL state table, snapshot retrieved 2026-10-10). City-only ordinances are excluded from the ranking because they cover only part of a county.
- Hours = monthly FMR ÷ hourly wage. A full-time month = 40 hours × 52 weeks ÷ 12 = 173.3 hours.
- Ranking. 3,144 counties in the 50 states and DC; rank 1 = most hours; ties share a rank. The California table is our own computation from the Rent Hours dataset (
scripts/derive_ca_rent.py), and it reproduces Santa Cruz’s national rank of 21.
Limits
Fair Market Rent is HUD’s estimate for voucher payments, not a listing price, and it lags the market. Most minimum-wage households have more than one earner or pay less than FMR by sharing or by living in older units. The measure ignores taxes, tips and benefits. It is a comparison across places, not a household budget.
Data and code
Every number and chart in this post is generated from these files:
The projects that collected the data:
- Rent Hours (source not published yet)