(Nov.26, 2025) As Nantucket continues to face one of the most acute housing shortages in the state, an important question keeps coming up: What number are we actually solving for? How many homes does the island need to ensure that year-round residents across income levels can afford to live here?

The 2025 Nantucket Housing Assessment provides several data-driven ways to answer that question. Each one offers a different lens into the scale of the need and together, they help clarify the path forward.

Reducing the Prevalence of Cost Burden

A large share of Nantucket households spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing, a common benchmark for measuring affordability. Nantucket has higher proportions of cost burdened and severely cost burdened households than both state and national levels. To reduce these rates, the island would need between 590 and 765 additional homes that are affordable to low, moderate, and middle income households.

This approach focuses on restoring balance so that housing costs align with what is typical elsewhere.

Meeting the Town’s Subsidized Housing Obligations

The Town reports that by the end of 2025 its Subsidized Housing Inventory will include 402 units. Achieving the Town’s Chapter 40B requirement of 618 SHI units would align with the state’s framework for determining how much housing is needed to serve households in the low income bracket. Reaching this threshold would require adding 216 SHI-eligible homes.

Right-Sizing the Rental Market

Nantucket has significantly fewer rental units than comparable places. If the island had the same proportions of owner- and renter-occupied housing as Massachusetts or the U.S., Nantucket would need:

• 892 additional rental units to match U.S. averages
• 1,081 additional rental units to match Massachusetts averages

This method highlights a critical structural challenge: Nantucket’s rental stock is far too small to meet demand.

Expanding Homeownership Opportunities

Middle-income residents, those earning between 175% and 240% of AMI, have extremely limited access to homeownership. Providing 140 income-restricted ownership units would give these islanders the same chance to buy a home that they might have elsewhere.

This approach focuses on long-term community stability and the ability of families to build roots.

A Multi-Dimensional Housing Need

There is no single number or single solution. Depending on the lens:

• 590–765 homes are needed to reduce cost burden
• 618 homes would meet the needs of households below 80% AMI
• 892–1,081 rental units are needed to rebalance the rental market
• 140 ownership units are needed for middle-income buyers

Together, these findings confirm that Nantucket faces layered, overlapping housing shortages that affect residents at every income level and stage of life.

Understanding these numbers helps guide the island toward strategic, targeted solutions and a future where year-round residents can truly thrive.