Housing Crisis

Kingston, Jamaica — 27 June 2026 A housing affordability crisis across the Western world has finally forced its way onto…

Informal housing was 18 times more likely to suffer severe damage from Melissa than formal housing. With 600,000 Jamaicans in weak tenure situations and a pre-existing housing deficit of 200,000 units, the physical rebuild alone will not resolve the structural conditions that made the catastrophe so devastating.

Over 100 days after Hurricane Melissa, Black River’s commercial district remains largely frozen. Business owners are unwilling to rebuild without clarity on the government’s relocation plans, and the property market consequences of prolonged uncertainty are mounting.

Hurricane Melissa destroyed in hours what had stood in Black River for over two centuries. The collapse of St John’s Anglican Church, the loss of Waterloo House and the erasure of Victorian-era commercial buildings have ended a heritage that Jamaica was still learning how to protect.

Hurricane Melissa’s destruction of Black River in October 2025 has triggered a housing and land crisis across western Jamaica. With tens of thousands of homes lost, the country faces its most serious rebuilding challenge in modern history.

Kingston tenement yards housed families ten to a single room. Frome workers rioted over wages, land, and company housing control.…