Jaebadiah Gardner Gabriella Buono
Most people feel it at the register, looking at a receipt that is higher than expected and deciding what to cut next time. Skip eating out this week? Drive farther for cheaper groceries? These quiet trade-offs have become part of daily life in Seattle, even for households that once felt comfortably secure.
This is no longer an abstract policy debate. It is a shared problem, one that cuts across neighborhoods and ideologies, and one we should all strive to address.
Seattle consistently ranks among the most expensive cities in the country. The median home price is roughly double the national average. Rents run 30% to 40% higher than elsewhere in the U.S. Even everyday essentials cost more, leaving households spending thousands extra each year to maintain the same standard of living.
What is often missing from the affordability conversation is that these pressures do not start with consumers. They hit neighborhood businesses and the people who run them first.
Seattle’s small business owners have spent years trying to absorb rising costs, from rent and insurance to utilities, labor and compliance. But there is a limit. When costs continue to rise, local businesses face tough choices: close their doors, cut hours or jobs or pass those costs on to customers. None of those outcomes makes Seattle more affordable.
With a new mayor and new members of the City Council, Seattle is in a narrow moment of opportunity. The decisions made now will determine whether Seattle remains a place where people can live, work and build a future, or whether more families, workers and neighborhood businesses are pushed out.
Without decisive leadership, affordability will continue to erode.
Here is how Seattle can act with urgency and change course.
- Build more housing, faster
Seattle’s housing shortage remains the single biggest driver of rising costs. The result is predictable: higher rents, longer commutes and families priced out of the communities they helped build.
City leadership should act urgently to increase housing supply by accelerating zoning updates in urban and regional centers, reducing delays and removing barriers that drive up construction costs. Incentives should prioritize workforce housing for the people who keep the city running.
- Reduce crime to bring down everyday prices
Retail crime does not just affect store owners. It shows up directly on price tags.
Grocery stores, pharmacies and neighborhood retailers operate on thin margins. When theft and vandalism increase, prices rise or stores close. Seattle has already seen essential retailers — Fred Meyer in Lake City and Ross Dress for Less downtown — shut down or plan to shutdown locations, creating food deserts and less access to affordable goods.
A renewed focus on reducing theft and vandalism, paired with smart public-private partnerships, can lower operating costs and reduce price pressure for customers.
- Eating out without overspending
Seattle’s food scene is under real strain. Restaurant closures are no longer isolated stories. They are a trend.
Rising labor, rent and operating costs have left restaurant owners with few options. Conversations about wages and labor policies are difficult but avoiding them does not help workers or restaurant owners.
City leaders should bring restaurant owners, workers and delivery partners together to examine the real-world impacts of policies such as the expiration of the tip credit and ensure that good intentions are not accelerating closures, job losses or higher menu prices.
- Lower costs of starting and running a small business
Small businesses are the backbone of Seattle’s neighborhoods yet rising fees and complex permitting make survival harder each year.
Reducing or eliminating unnecessary licensing fees, expanding proven recovery programs like Back to Business and Seattle Restore, and providing multilingual business liaisons would help neighborhood businesses keep their doors open rather than passing rising costs on to customers.
- Protect jobs to protect affordability
If affordability is the goal, job growth must be part of the solution.
Seattle’s job growth is slowing at the same time small business owners and local employers are facing rising costs. Taxes on jobs are passed on through higher prices for housing, food, child care and transportation.
A clear commitment from city leadership to avoid increasing the Payroll Expense Tax or any new taxes on job-creating businesses would help local employers keep investing in workers rather than raising prices or leaving the city. Improving the predictability of the city’s tax and regulatory environment would encourage businesses of all sizes to grow jobs in Seattle, leading to more economic activity, a broader tax base, and more sustainable long-term revenue.
- Bring urgency to downtown’s recovery
Downtown Seattle remains the economic and cultural heart of the city, and its recovery must be a top priority.
With the 2026 FIFA World Cup approaching, the city has a narrow window to accelerate downtown’s comeback. That means focusing on immediate, practical actions: making the holiday on downtown design review permanent, simplifying event permitting, ensuring streets feel safe and welcoming and maintaining reliable access to downtown businesses during transit construction.
Taken together, these steps would help activate downtown in the near term, support small businesses and build momentum for a stronger city core.
Cities become more affordable when leaders consider the full scope of the challenge, from families and workers to the neighborhood businesses that anchor our communities and take practical steps to address it.
Seattle can still change course. But only if it acts now.
Jaebadiah Gardner: is the Seattle-based founder and CEO of GardnerGlobal, a businessman, multifamily developer, fund manager and author.
Gabriella Buono: is interim president and CEO of the Seattle Metro Chamber of Commerce.