Administration Announces Housing Supply Action Plan
On May 16, the administration announced a housing supply action plan that is intended to “ease the burden of housing costs over time, by boosting the supply of quality housing in every community.” The plan includes both legislative and administrative actions and is meant to align with other policies currently in effect (e.g., federal rental assistance) to create more affordable rents and make homeownership more affordable.
While the plan includes many specific actions, many of those actions can be grouped into the following categories.
- Incentivizing jurisdictions to reform their zoning and land-use policies by giving higher scores to jurisdictions that do this in federal grant allocations.
- Implementing new financing mechanisms to build and preserve housing, including manufactured housing; accessory dwelling units; two to four unit properties; and other multifamily buildings.
- Improving existing federal financing for development and preservation, which includes making construction to permanent loans more available; promoting the use of COVID recovery funds for affordable housing; reforming the low-income housing tax credit and the HOME program.
- Ensuring that more housing goes to owners that live in the units or non-profits that will rehabilitate them.
- Addressing supply chain issues by working with the private sector.
The White House’s full announcement of their housing supply action plan can be found here.