Cleveland Metro 2nd Cheapest for Buying a Home: Study

If you're looking to buy a home in the Cleveland Metro area, it might be cheaper than you expect.

The Cleveland Metro was ranked second most affordable in the nation for home buyers by HSH.com, an online publisher of mortgage and consumer loan information. To determine their rankings, HSH.com calculated the annual salary needed to afford the principal and interest payments on a median-priced home in 27 metro areas in the United States.

The result for Cleveland: An annual salary of $32,523.47

The salary was calculated using 28 percent "front-end" debt-to-income ratios — considered standard by HSH.com. The study also assumed that the home buyer would be forking over 20 percent of the payment up front. The study found that Cleveland home buyers would have to earn $4,200 more a year with a 10 percent downpayment.

With a median home price price of $121,800 and a 4 percent 30-year fixed mortgage rate, the average monthly payment for Cleveland home buyers was just $758.88. That was second only to $726.47 in Pittsburgh.

Nationwide, home buying became more affordable because of falling home prices and lower mortgage rates, according to the study. Affordability improved in all but two metro areas, a trend the study does not expect to continue in 2016 due to a lack of inventory.

Here are the top 5 most affordable cities for home buying:

1. Pittsburgh: Required annual salary of $31,134.50
2. Cleveland: Required annual salary of $32,523.47
3. Cincinnati: Required annual salary of $33,967.01
4. St. Louis: Required annual salary of $34,777.53
5. Detroit: Required annual salary of $36,914.56

And the five most expensive:

1. San Francisco: Required annual salary of $147,996.19
2. San Diego: Required annual salary of $103,164.96
3. Los Angeles: Required annual salary of $95,040.20
4. New York City: Required annual salary of $86,770.19
5. Boston: Required annual salary of $83,151.43

Here's the full breakdown of the Cleveland numbers, according to HSH.com:

Mortgage rate: 4.00 percent

• Quarterly change: -0.08 percent

Home price: $121,800

• Quarterly change: -7.73 percent

• YOY change: +0.50 percent

Monthly payment: $758.88

Salary: $32,523.47

• Quarterly change: -$1,878.84