2023 Annual Disability Statistics Compendium

Section 7: Home Environment
This section presents statistics on the home environment for people with and without disabilities in the United States. The home environment includes factors such as housing quality, age of home (i.e., year built), and housing type (i.e., house, apartment, mobile homes). More specifically, the housing quality features that are presented here include: lacking a complete kitchen, lacking complete plumbing, overcrowding (two or more people living in home per bedroom), and cost burden (thirty percent or more of household income spent on housing costs). The age of home statistic presented is whether a home was built in 1990 or after (the year the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law). Statistics for people with disabilities (disability status or disability type) are based on having responded ‘yes’ to a series of questions within the American Community Survey (see the glossary for more details).
The poor housing quality measure presented in this section identifies people who are experiencing two of four possible difficulties related to housing quality described above. This measure is part of a larger multidimensional deprivation index that is considered a measure of poverty. Multidimensional deprivation is a more holistic, comprehensive view of well-being than traditional income-based poverty measures. It includes people who may be facing difficulties or hardships who may not be income poor. The housing quality element of deprivation captures people experiencing difficulties with physical space and security within their own home. Our estimates were based on reports on multidimensional deprivation published by researchers at the Census Bureau, including:
Glassman, Brian, “Multidimensional Deprivation in the United States: 2017," American Community Survey Reports, ACS-40, U.S. Census Bureau, Washington, DC, 2019.
This report on multidimensional deprivation can be found online: https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2019/demo/acs-40.pdf.
Tables
Table 7.1: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities living in homes without a complete kitchen was California with 27,612 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities living in homes without a complete kitchen was Alaska (3.7 percent).
Table 7.2: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities living in homes without complete plumbing was Texas with 19,332 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities living in homes without complete plumbing was Alaska (5.4 percent).
Table 7.3: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities living in overcrowded homes was California with 208,779 people. The greatest percentage of people with disabilities living in overcrowded homes was in California (10.3 percent).
Table 7.4: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities experiencing housing cost burden was California with 870,460 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities experiencing housing cost burden was Hawaii and Vermont (46.6 percent).
Table 7.5: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities experiencing poor housing quality was California with 431,398 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities experiencing poor housing quality was the District of Columbia (24.5 percent).
Table 7.6: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities living in homes built in 1990 or later was Texas with 811,704 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities living in homes built in 1990 or later was Nevada (55.1 percent).
Table 7.7: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities living in houses (not apartments or mobile homes) was California with 1,328,673 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities living in houses (not apartments or mobile homes) was Delaware (75.5 percent).
Table 7.8: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities living in apartments (not houses or mobile homes) was California with 595,569 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities living in apartments (not houses or mobile homes) was the District of Columbia (67.4 percent).
Table 7.9: In 2021, the state with the greatest number of people with disabilities living in mobile homes (not houses or apartments) was Texas with 168,973 people. The state with the greatest percentage of people with disabilities living in mobile homes was South Carolina (21.2 percent).