While Santa Clarita typically ranks pretty high on lists of cities when the experts look at park space, safety and schools, WalletHub put Santa Clarita at No. 1 in the nation for an honor most would rather not share: the highest credit card debt per household.
The report published by the free personal-finance website looked at TransUnion and Federal Reserve data on credit card debt, according to Adam McCann, who wrote the report for WalletHub.
The report estimated the average debt at $23,714 per household, for an estimated figure of just over 75,800 households. That put the city’s total credit card debt at a staggering $1,797,709,958, according to the article — enough to buy most NFL franchises, construct a skyscraper in a major metropolitan area or feed several hundred thousand L.A. County residents for a year.
Santa Clarita spokeswoman Carrie Lujan declined to comment on the report.
While tens of thousands of dollars in credit card debt sounds daunting, a WalletHub analyst pointed out that four of the top five cities — Santa Clarita (1), Chula Vista (2), Pearl City, Hawaii (3) and New York (4), could have top spots more reflective of the area’s relative affluence and and access to wealth.
“Cities where households owe the most credit card debt, like Santa Clarita and Chula Vista, as well as Pearl City, have high median incomes, high debt payoff rates and low delinquency rates,” wrote John Kiernan, a WalletHub analyst. ‘’This indicates that residents may simply have high credit card limits and can afford to borrow more.”
WalletHub compared more than 180 of the largest cities in the U.S. based on the federal and credit agency data, adjusted for inflation. Of the cities in the top 10, Santa Clarita had the highest median income of all California cities at a little over $123,000 per year, based on the most recent data available from the U.S. Census.
Rancho Cucamonga was fifth on the list with $19,619 per household, and its median income was nearly $112,000 per year. Oxnard, the closest city in the top 10, had an average debt of $19,277 per household with a median income of $96,212.
It’s also probably not a big surprise that California has the most cities on the top 10 list (seven), as the cost of living in the Golden State is 44% higher than the national average, according to an apartment-search website, RentCafe.com.
The Public Policy Institute of California reported in May that the cost of utilities throughout the state is just one area where costs have skyrocketed for Californians in recent years and is expected to continue. Homeowners insurance also has been cited as a growing concern.
