SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) –It’s often called the American Dream; homeownership.

But in today’s economy and with what’s happening with the housing market, that dream is looking less likely to happen for a lot of young families.

That’s why Congress is hoping to pass legislation to try and help.

When it comes to today’s housing market two words keep coming up; availability and affordability.

“On the sale side people come in and they have this mentality of what they could have bought a couple of years ago with 3% interest rate and now that’s a little different so they are adjusting accordingly and making it work for whatever fits their needs,” former President of South Dakota Realtors Association Brandon Martens said.

But some families still can’t afford it.

In May of this year, the average price of a house that sold in Sioux Falls was just over $362 thousand dollars; almost an 8% increase over last year.

“That has taken a lot of average Americans out of the homeownership market,” Senator Mike Rounds said.

Senator Mike Rounds, who serves on the Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, has been holding a series of round table discussions across the state.

“What we are trying to do to find out from folks who are working on housing issues in South Dakota what we can do specifically with regard to federal legislation,” Rounds said.

Rounds says communities all over the country are feeling the constraints of housing affordability – and one of the hurdles is over-burdensome regulations.

“The projects that we are working on right now how do we keep interest rates down, how do we provide incentives for people to actually get into homes, what do we do to keep down payments down; there are federal programs, but it’s also a matter of making sure the regulatory side of things is such that it doesn’t impair our ability to build new houses across the entire country, ” Rounds said.

Rents are also going up.

When comparing last year with this year, Rounds says South Dakota has the highest year-over-year rent growth of 26% with a median rent of just over $11 hundred dollars per month.