Housing affordability is the Atlanta region’s top concern, according to the 2025 Metro Atlanta Speaks public opinion survey, released today by the Atlanta Regional Commission. When asked about the biggest problem facing metro Atlanta, 28% of the respondents said housing affordability, followed by traffic (24%), and crime and the economy (13% each).

This is the first year that housing affordability was offered as a choice to this survey question. Last year, the economy was the region’s top concern, followed by crime.

ARC conducts the Metro Atlanta Speaks survey to gather key insights into quality-of-life issues such as transportation, the economy, and housing. This year, ARC included new questions about two urgent topics: housing and artificial intelligence.

Highlights of the 2025 survey include:

• Housing affordability remains a concern for many: More than six in 10 respondents (62%) said they could not afford to move to another house or apartment in their current neighborhood, about the same as last year.

• Builders and investors viewed as main causes of housing affordability challenges: In a new question this year, 44% of respondents said the main cause of the region’s housing affordability challenge is developers building units that are too expensive , followed by investors buying up homes to rent out (35%).

• Mixed views on impact of AI: In new questions involving artificial intelligence, 61% of survey respondents said they believe AI technology will increase productivity, and about half (49%) said AI will make life easier. But nearly three in four respondents (73%) said AI will decrease the number of available jobs.

• Worry over economy grows: Over half of respondents (53%) said it’s a bad time to find a well-paying job, an increase from last year (41%), the first year we asked this question.

• Negative outlook in the near term: Nearly half (46.5%) of respondents said they expected living conditions in metro Atlanta to be worse in the next 3-4 years, while 16% said they thought things would be better over that time period. That’s a sizable change from last year, when 33% said things would be worse off and 28% said they’d be better.

“Each year, the Metro Atlanta Speaks survey provides valuable insights about where we are as a region, and where we are headed,” said Atlanta Regional Commission Chair Andre Dickens, who also serves as Mayor of the City of Atlanta. “On this year’s survey, the concerns over housing affordability came through loud and clear. Our region is making meaningful progress on this challenge, but there’s no doubt we have more work to do.”

The survey also found continued support for public transit. Nearly four in 10 respondents (39%) said expanding public transit is the best long-term solution to the region’s traffic problems, ahead of improving roads and highways at 34%.

And more than half of respondents (53%) said future growth in metro Atlanta should be focused along existing transportation corridors and in areas where businesses are already concentrated.

The hybrid phone and online survey was  administered by Kennesaw State University’s A.L. Burruss Institute of Public Service and Research, asked questions of 4,121adult residents across 11 counties in the metro Atlanta region this past August. Survey results are statistically significant for each of those 11 counties and the City of Atlanta, with a margin of error of plus or minus 1.5% for the 11-county region as a whole and plus or minus 3.8% to 5.7% for the individual jurisdictions.

For additional information about the 2025 survey, including county level results, please visit atlantaregional.org/metroatlantaspeaks.