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2025-12-26 20:41:53

Existing home sales inch up in July on modest pullback in mortgage rates

Real Estate

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Existing home sales inch up in July on modest pullback in mortgage rates 2025-12-26 20:41:53

Existing home sales inch up in July on modest pullback in mortgage rates

Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes rose in July as homebuyers were encouraged by a modest pullback in mortgage rates, slowing home price growth and the most properties on the market in over five years.Recommended VideoExisting home sales rose 2% last month from June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.01 million units, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday.Sales edged up 0.8% compared with July last year. The latest sales figure topped the 3.92 million pace economists were expecting, according to FactSet.Home prices rose on an annual basis for the 25th consecutive month, although the rate of growth continued to slow. The national median sales price inched up just 0.2% in July from a year earlier to $422,400.That was the smallest annual increase since June 2023. Even so, the median home sales price last month is the highest for any previous July, based on data going back to 1999.“The ever-so-slight improvement in housing affordability is inching up home sales,” said Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist. “Wage growth is now comfortably outpacing home price growth, and buyers have more choices.”The U.S. housing market has been in a sales slump since 2022, when mortgage rates began climbing from historic lows. Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes sank last year to their lowest level in nearly 30 years.This year’s spring homebuying season, which is traditionally the busiest period of the year for the housing market, was a bust as stubbornly high mortgage rates put off many prospective homebuyers. Affordability remains a dauting challenge for most aspiring homeowners following years of skyrocketing home prices.First-time homebuyers, who don’t have home equity gains to put toward a new home purchase, accounted for 28% of homes sales last month, down from 30% in June, NAR said. Historically, they made up 40% of home sales.The average rate on a 30-year mortgage has remained elevated this year, although it has been at a nearly 10-month low of 6.58% the last two weeks.Homes purchased last month likely went under contract in May and June, when the average rate ranged from 6.76% to 6.89%. Mortgage rates eased in July, dropping briefly to 6.67%.As home sales have slowed, the number of unsold homes on the market has been rising.There were 1.55 million unsold homes at the end of last month, up 0.6% from June and 15.7% from July last year, NAR said. That’s the most homes on the market since May 2020, early on in the COVID-19 pandemic.Still, the inventory remains well below the roughly 2 million homes for sale that was typical before the pandemic.July’s month-end inventory translates to a 4.6-month supply at the current sales pace, down from a 4.7-month supply at the end of June and up from 4 months in July last year. Traditionally, a 5- to 6-month supply is considered a balanced market between buyers and sellers.Homes are also taking longer to sell. Properties typically remained on the market for 28 days last month before selling, up from 24 days in July last year, NAR said.Home shoppers who can afford to buy at current mortgage rates or pay in cash are likely to benefit from the slower growth in prices and increased supply of properties on the market.It’s not uncommon now for sellers, especially those in Southern and Western markets, to lower their asking price and offer incentives such as money for closing costs or repairs in order to sweeten the deal, real estate agents say.In July, some 20.6% of homes listed for sale had their price reduced, according to Realtor.com. That’s down slightly from June.“One can say that things are a little better today as a buyer, compared to say just a couple of years ago,” Yun said.Join us at the Fortune Workplace Innovation SummitMay 19–20, 2026, in Atlanta. The next era of workplace innovation is here—and the old playbook is being rewritten. At this exclusive, high-energy event, the world’s most innovative leaders will convene to explore how AI, humanity, and strategy converge to redefine, again, the future of work. Register now.

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‘Just another nail in the coffin for rural areas’: Affordable housing program faces the axe under Trump’s tax, budget cuts 2025-12-28 19:25:38

‘Just another nail in the coffin for rural areas’: Affordable housing program faces the axe under Trump’s tax, budget cuts

Heather Colley and her two children moved four times over five years as they fled high rents in eastern Tennessee, which, like much of rural America, hasn’t been spared from soaring housing costs.Recommended VideoA family gift in 2021 of a small plot of land offered a shot at homeownership, but building a house was beyond reach for the 45-year-old single mother and manicurist making $18.50 an hour.That changed when she qualified for $272,000 from a nonprofit to build a three-bedroom home because of a grant program that has helped make affordable housing possible in rural areas for decades. She moved in last June.“Every time I pull into my garage, I pinch myself,” Colley said.Now, President Donald Trump wants to eliminate that grant, the HOME Investment Partnerships Program, and House Republicans overseeing federal budget negotiations did not include funding for it in their budget proposal. Experts and state housing agencies say that would set back tens of thousands of future affordable housing developments nationwide, particularly hurting Appalachian towns and rural counties where government aid is sparse and investors are few.The program has helped build or repair more than 1.3 million affordable homes in the last three decades, of which at least 540,000 were in congressional districts that are rural or significantly rural, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal data.“Maybe they don’t realize how far-reaching these programs are,” said Colley, who voted for Trump in 2024. Among those half a million homes that HOME helped build, 84% were in districts that voted for him last year, the AP analysis found.“I understand we don’t want excessive spending and wasting taxpayer dollars,” Colley said, “but these proposed budget cuts across the board make me rethink the next time I go to the polls.”The HOME program, started under President George H. W. Bush in the 1990s, survived years of budget battles but has been stretched thin by years of rising construction costs and stagnant funding. That’s meant fewer units, including in some rural areas where home prices have grown faster than in cities.The program has spent more than $38 billion nationwide since it began filling in funding gaps and attracting more investment to acquire, build and repair affordable homes, HUD data shows. Additional funding has gone toward projects that have yet to be finished and rental assistance.HOME’s future is in political limboTo account for the gap left by the proposed cuts, House Republicans want to draw on nearly $5 billion from a related pandemic-era fund that gave states until 2030 to spend on projects supporting people who are unhoused or facing homelessness.That $5 billion, however, may be far less, since many projects haven’t yet been logged into the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s tracking system, according to state housing agencies and associations representing them.A spokesperson for HUD, which administers the program, said HOME isn’t as effective as other programs where the money would be better spent.In opposition to Trump, Senate Republicans have still included funding for HOME in their draft budget. In the coming negotiations, both chambers may compromise and reduce but not terminate HOME’s funding, or extend last years’ overall budget.White House spokesperson Davis Ingle didn’t respond to specific questions from the AP. Instead, Ingle said that Trump’s commitment to cutting red tape is making housing more affordable.A bipartisan group of House lawmakers is working to reduce HOME’s notorious red tape that even proponents say slows construction.Some rural areas are more dependent on HOMEIn Owsley County — one of the nation’s poorest, located in the rural Kentucky hills — residents struggle in an economy blighted by coal mine closures and declining tobacco crop revenues.Affordable homes are needed there, but tough to build in a region that doesn’t attract larger-scale rental developments that federal dollars typically go toward.That’s where HOME comes in, said Cassie Hudson, who runs Partnership Housing in Owsley, which has relied on the program to build the majority of its affordable homes for at least a dozen years.A lack of additional funding for HOME has already made it hard to keep up with construction costs, Hudson said, and the organization builds a quarter of the single-family homes it used to.“Particularly for deeply rural places and persistent poverty counties, local housing developers are the only way homes and new rental housing gets built,” said Joshua Stewart of Fahe, a coalition of Appalachian nonprofits.That’s in part because investment is scant and HOME steps in when construction costs exceed what a home can be sold for — a common barrier in poor areas of Appalachia. Some developers use the profits to build more affordable units. Its loss would erode those nonprofits’ ability to build affordable homes in years to come, Stewart said.One of those nonprofits, Housing Development Alliance, helped Tiffany Mullins in Hazard, Kentucky, which was ravaged by floods. Mullins, a single mother of four who makes $14.30 an hour at Walmart, bought a house there thanks to HOME funding and moved in August.Mullins sees the program as preserving a rural way of life, recalling when folks owned homes and land “with gardens, we had chickens, cows. Now you don’t see much of that.”It’s a long-term impactIn congressional budget negotiations, HOME is an easier target than programs such as vouchers because most people would not immediately lose their housing, said Tess Hembree, executive director of the Council of State Community Development Agencies.The effect of any reduction would instead be felt in a fizzling of new affordable housing supply. When HOME funding was temporarily reduced to $900 million in 2015, “10 to 15 years later, we’re seeing the ramifications,” Hembree said.That includes affordable units built in cities. The biggest program that funds affordable rental housing nationwide, the Low Income Housing Tax Credit, uses HOME grants for 12% of units, totaling 324,000 current individual units, according to soon-to-be-published Urban Institute research.Trump’s spending bill that Republicans passed this summer increased LITHC, but experts say further reducing or cutting HOME would make those credits less usable.“It’s LITHC plus HOME, usually,” said Tim Thrasher, CEO of Community Action Partnership of North Alabama, which builds affordable apartments for some of the nation’s poorest.In the lush mountains of eastern West Virginia, Woodlands Development Group relies on HOME for its smaller rural projects. Because it helps people with a wider range of incomes, HOME is “one of the only programs available to us that allows us to develop true workforce housing,” said executive director Dave Clark.It’s those workers — nurses, first responders, teachers — that nonprofits like east Tennessee’s Creative Compassion use HOME to build for. With the program in jeopardy, grant administrator Sarah Halcott said she fears for her clients battling rising housing costs.“This is just another nail in the coffin for rural areas,” Halcott said.___Kramon reported from Atlanta. Bedayn reported from Denver. Herbst contributed from New York City, and Kessler reported from Washington, D.C.___Kramon is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.Join us at the Fortune Workplace Innovation SummitMay 19–20, 2026, in Atlanta. The next era of workplace innovation is here—and the old playbook is being rewritten. At this exclusive, high-energy event, the world’s most innovative leaders will convene to explore how AI, humanity, and strategy converge to redefine, again, the future of work. Register now.

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  • 2026-01-15 20:35:33

    New home inventory is at its highest level since just before the housing market collapse that led to the Great Recession, but that doesn’t mean it’s the same market

    The U.S. housing market’s inventory is growing, putting pressure on prices and slowing new construction, according to fresh research from the Bank of America Institute. As of June, existing-home supply reached 4.7 months, the highest level since July 2016. New-home supply surged even further to 9.8 months—its highest point since 2022—highlighting how quickly inventory is building across the housing market.Recommended VideoThe influx of available homes reflects sluggish demand, with builders citing weak buyer urgency, affordability challenges, and lingering job instability. The Institute noted new-home inventory is now at its highest level since 2007, the year before the housing market collapse that led to the Great Financial Crisis.ResiClub co-founder Lance Lambert toldFortunethat the rising inventory tells us that “homebuyers are gaining leverage” as slack in the housing market is increasing. “The Pandemic Housing Boom saw too much housing demand all at once, home prices overheated too fast in many markets, and underlying fundamentals got too stretched.”Lambert characterized the last few years as a “recalibration period” where the housing market is smoothing out that excess. Mounting inventory sucks out appreciation in more markets—and even causes outright corrections in some markets’ home prices. He said he expects the underlying fundamentals to slowly improve as that happens and incomes keep rising. “It takes time.” This period is different from 2007, he said, because that window saw a far greater weakening of the housing market and upswing in resale inventory, along with unsold, completed newbuild homes.BofA ResearchOne striking shift: The median price of a new home has actually fallen below that of an existing home—a reversal of the usual market dynamic. BofA said this pricing inversion underscores how builders are being forced to discount amid rising supply and softer demand. “Builders are starting to pull back on new home starts in many markets,” Bank of America wrote. While the slowdown is broad-based, conditions vary regionally, with some areas such as the Midwest proving more resilient than others.“Since the Pandemic Housing Boom fizzled out in 2022, and the affordability squeeze was fully felt,” Lambert toldFortune, “the national power dynamic has slowly been shifting from sellers to buyers as homes have a harder time selling and active inventory for sale builds.”Still, Lambert noted the inventory picture varies significantly across the country. For instance, it remains most limited across notable sections of the Midwest and the Northeast, although still growing, he said. On the other hand, active inventory has neared or surpassed pre-pandemic 2019 levels in many parts of the Sun Belt and Mountain West, and he said that is where homebuyers have gained the most leverage.The trend comes as the Federal Reserve has begun trimming interest rates in an effort to support both broader economic growth and housing affordability. Whether those cuts will be enough to reignite demand remains an open question.For now, the data signals a market in transition: high inventory, moderating prices, and builders caught between a cautious consumer and the need to manage supply.For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing. Join us at the Fortune Workplace Innovation SummitMay 19–20, 2026, in Atlanta. The next era of workplace innovation is here—and the old playbook is being rewritten. At this exclusive, high-energy event, the world’s most innovative leaders will convene to explore how AI, humanity, and strategy converge to redefine, again, the future of work. Register now.

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  • 2026-01-20 18:25:32

    30-year mortgage rate holds steady at lowest level in nearly 10 months

    The average rate on a 30-year U.S. mortgage held steady this week at its lowest level in nearly 10 months, an encouraging sign for prospective homebuyers who have been held back by stubbornly high home financing costs.Recommended VideoThe long-term rate was unchanged from last week at 6.58%, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday. A year ago, the rate averaged 6.46%.Borrowing costs on 15-year fixed-rate mortgages, popular with homeowners refinancing their home loans, edged lower. The average rate dropped to 5.69% from 5.71% last week. A year ago, it was 5.62%, Freddie Mac said.Stubbornly high mortgage rates have helped keep the U.S. housing market in a sales slump since early 2022, when rates started to climb from the rock-bottom lows they reached during the pandemic. Home sales sank last year to their lowest level in nearly 30 years and have remained sluggish this year.For much of the year, the average rate on a 30-year mortgage has hovered relatively close to its 2025 high of just above 7%, set in mid-January. Since last week, the average rate has been at its lowest level since Oct. 24, when it averaged 6.54%.Mortgage rates are influenced by several factors, from the Federal Reserve’s interest rate policy decisions to bond market investors’ expectations for the economy and inflation.The main barometer is the 10-year Treasury yield, which lenders use as a guide to pricing home loans. The yield was at 4.34% at midday Thursday, up from 4.29% late Wednesday.The yield has been mostly rising this month as bond traders weighed how data on inflation and the job market, and the potential economic impact of Trump administration’s tariffs, may influence the Fed’s interest rate policy moves.The central bank has so far been hesitant to cut interest rates out of fear that Trump’s tariffs could push inflation higher, but data showing hiring slowed last month have fueled speculation that the Fed will cut its main short-term interest rate next month.A Fed rate cut could give the job market and overall economy a boost, but it could also fuel inflation, which could push bond yields higher, driving mortgage rates upward in turn.“Even if the Fed cuts the short-term federal funds rate in September, which is largely expected, it is not likely that we will see a big drop in mortgage rates,” said Lisa Sturtevant, chief economist at Bright MLS.Economists generally expect the average rate on a 30-year mortgage to remain near the mid-6% range this year.That may not be low enough to spur a meaningful increase in home sales.While the housing market slowdown is forcing many sellers to lower their asking price and even pay for a buyer’s closing costs, among other incentives, affordability remains a major hurdle for many aspiring homeowners.Home price growth has slowed nationally, but the median sales price of a previously occupied U.S. home remains near the all-time high of $435,300 set in June. And while prices are down from a year ago in many metro areas in the South and West such as Miami, Denver and Austin, they haven’t come down nearly enough to offset years of soaring prices.“Lower mortgage rates and slower price growth — or even year-over-year price declines — is going to be necessary to improve affordability and bring more homebuyers into the market,” Sturtevant said.Join us at the Fortune Workplace Innovation SummitMay 19–20, 2026, in Atlanta. The next era of workplace innovation is here—and the old playbook is being rewritten. At this exclusive, high-energy event, the world’s most innovative leaders will convene to explore how AI, humanity, and strategy converge to redefine, again, the future of work. Register now.

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  • 2026-01-20 15:08:47

    More than half of U.S. homes have dropped in value over the last year—and nearly all houses in these cities have seen losses

    The share of U.S. homes that have lost value in the past year is the highest since the aftermath of the Great Recession, according to Zillow.Recommended VideoIn October, 53% of homes saw their “Zestimates” decline, the most since 2012 and up from just 16% a year earlier. Losses were most widespread in the West and South.In fact, those regions have housing markets where nearly all homes declined in value over the last year. Denver topped the list with 91%, followed by Austin (89%), Sacramento (88%), Phoenix (87%), and Dallas (87%).The Northeast and Midwest, by contrast, have largely avoided such losses, but declines are spreading to more homes in all metros, Zillow said.In addition, most homes also dropped from their peak valuations, with the average drawdown hitting 9.7%. While that has soared from 3.5% in the spring of 2022, it’s still well below the 27% average drawdown in early 2012.To be sure, lower home values are just losses on paper and aren’t realized by homeowners unless actual sale prices undercut their initial purchase prices.By that score, homeowners are still ahead as Zillow data shows that values are up a median 67% since the last sale, and just 4.1% of homes have lost value since their last sale.“Homeowners may feel rattled when they see their Zestimate drop, and it’s more common in today’s cooler market environment than in recent years. But relatively few are selling at a loss,” Treh Manhertz, senior economic researcher at Zillow, said in a statement. “Home values surged over the past six years, and the vast majority of homeowners still have significant equity. What we’re seeing now is a normalization, not a crash.”ZillowThe lower values come as the housing market has been frozen for much of the past three years after rate hikes from the Federal Reserve in 2022 and 2023 sent borrowing costs higher, discouraging homeowners from giving up their existing ultralow mortgage rates.But the dearth of new supply kept home prices high, shutting out many would-be homebuyers who were also balking at elevated mortgage rates.With demand weak, the housing market has been shifting away from sellers and toward buyers. The pendulum has swung so far the other way that delistings soared this year as sellers became fed up with offers coming in below asking prices and just take their homes off the market.But the National Association of Realtors sees a turnaround coming next year. NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun predicted earlier this month existing-home sales will jump 14% in 2026 after three years of stagnation, with new-home sales rising 5%. Those sales will support a 4% uptick in home prices.“Next year is really the year that we will see a measurable increase in sales,” Yun said at a conference on Nov. 14. “Home prices nationwide are in no danger of declining.”

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A Lifetime of Building Community in New Orleans 2026-01-08 21:02:50

A Lifetime of Building Community in New Orleans

Emelda Paul was 23 when she moved to a new apartment just a few blocks and “over the tracks” from her childhood home. She had three young daughters, and Lafitte — the public housing complex in New Orleans’ storied Tremé neighborhood — felt like the perfect place to raise a family. Nearly 70 years later, Paul calls herself a lifetime Lafitte resident, even after the bricks of the original buildings have been replaced with colorful rows of townhomes built to mirror New Orleans architectural style to become Faubourg Lafitte. In August of 2005, Hurricane Katrina upended her life and sent her to Arizona temporarily, but the story of Lafitte and the arc of Paul’s life have continued to intersect to this day. Even after the original Lafitte was demolished and redeveloped, she moved back and continued to play an active role in the community.“People from New Orleans are resilient. We bounce back,” Paul said in a recent interview. “We fall down, but we get up.”Early YearsEmelda Paul was born 91 years ago, not far from her current apartment at Faubourg Lafitte in the Treme neighborhood. Not long after, the first residents moved into newly constructed public housing known as “Lafitte Place.” ImageFamily photos line the walls of Paul's Faubourg Lafitte apartmentPaul and her grandmother had moved to the St. Bernard Housing, where she lived until she started a family of her own. “When I heard I could apply to live at Lafitte, I did just that,” Paul said.Raising a FamilyAt 23, Paul was overjoyed after moving to Lafitte with her three young daughters. “We lived right here on Roman Street in one of the original buildings, and we loved it,” Paul said. “In the early days at Lafitte, we all worked together.”Paul says she and her family spent so much at time at the park (now the Greenway), that people called it “Miss Emelda Park.” She tended to her garden, sat on her porch to socialize with neighbors, and jumped in to help with neighborhood issues whenever she could.ImagePaul returned to the Tremé neighborhood after Katrina“My family used the park at Lafitte all the time,” she said. That continued even after she became a grandmother. “Whenever the lights would go out, my grandson’s friends would say ‘go tell Miss Mel the lights are out in the park.’ In other words, I was the type of person to make sure things in the neighborhood were working.”Up until Hurricane Katrina, 2,000 residents including 800 children lived at Lafitte. Now, construction has begun on the last redevelopment phase.Katrina Hits“I was sitting in the kitchen and my daughter and her friends were out on the porch. The water was rising, but I said, ‘we’re not going anywhere.’” Soon though, cars were floating by outside Paul’s window, and she realized it was time to go. She and her family walked along the Interstate, eventually ending up at her other daughter’s home, and then the airport.ImageLeaving New OrleansPaul flew to Arizona, where she stayed with a granddaughter who lived there. “We were all taken out of our comfort zones and living in strange places where they called us ‘refugees.’ “She ended up spending two years in Arizona, joining a local choir, attending city council meetings, and “getting involved in almost everything,” including organizing a local Mardi Gras celebration. Still, Arizona didn’t feel like home and Paul and her family made plans to return to New Orleans.Demolition of Lafitte While Paul was away, she was upset to find out that the Lafitte was sealed up and slated for demolition. She recognizes though that even before Katrina, the Lafitte buildings had fallen into disrepair. “Maybe it was time for us to move because those bricks were deteriorating and there were a lot of things that needed to be repaired. And they were being neglected.” Once Paul had packed up a U-Haul and ventured home, she moved into a senior community on the West Bank in New Orleans.Redevelopment and rebuildingMy name is Emelda Paul. I was a 30-year resident of Lafitte and I am the president of the Lafitte Residents Council. I am here because I want our people, our families to return home to New Orleans. testimony before Congress in September of 2007After HUD and HANO announced the decision to demolish the “Big Four” New Orleans public housing developments, the agencies selected Enterprise and Providence (L&M Development was eventually added to the team) to redevelop Lafitte. Paul was one resident who spoke out in favor of the plan to rebuild. “I had to do a lot of testifying and a lot of talking,” including a trip to Washington, D. C. to testify before Congress on the need for redevelopment and improvements in the new Lafitte.Enterprise and Providence agreed to three core commitments as they began the redevelopment process: Listening to community voices during the redevelopment process, giving the 865 former Lafitte families and individuals the opportunity and first priority to return home, building 900 subsidized, affordable homes as part of a mixed-income community on and around the site.Back at HomeOn a recent warm and steamy August day, Emelda Paul shared her story at an event where local leaders and community members gathered to celebrate the groundbreaking of the last redevelopment phase on the footprint of the former public housing site at Faubourg Lafitte. This phase will continue to advance the development of the former Lafitte public housing site, a process that began 18 years ago.ImagePaul loves her Faubourg Lafitte apartment where she has lived for over a decade now, a place that is filled with family photos and a lifetime of mementos. “I can look right out on the Mardi Gras from here,” she said. “The only thing I miss is the porch where I used to spend so much time.”At 91, Paul is still active in the community, volunteers at a local hospital, and is in regular contact with management when she sees any problems. “I get along with management and with residents.” There have been some recent disagreements; a younger couple nearby plays loud music and some residents have complained. “I say they can play their music. Look, I was young once too,” she said. “So, I let them play their music and I close my door and it’s fine. What’s important is that we still look out for each other.”Related Topics:Gulf Coast

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From Recovery to Resilience in Puerto Rico: Five Key Takeaways 2026-01-21 12:15:43

From Recovery to Resilience in Puerto Rico: Five Key Takeaways

The people of Puerto Rico have endured significant losses in recent years due to climate change- induced disasters, including Hurricanes Maria and Irma. From frequent storms that accelerate flooding to heat waves that make everyday tasks challenging, stakeholders across Puerto Rico continue to pursue innovative strategies to rebuild, recover, and ensure that the lowest-income households are not left behind in the aftermath of extreme weather events.Puerto Rico’s commitment to community-driven solutions was palpable when Enterprise, LISC, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York capped off 2024 with an event in San Juan that gathered housing and climate experts working on both the Island and the mainland.The event, “Recovery to Resilience: Collaborative Solutions for a Sustainable Puerto Rico,” highlighted strategies and initiatives from the book What’s Possible: Investing NOW for Prosperous, Sustainable Neighborhoods, as well as programs and innovations led by the Puerto Rico Department of Housing, HUD, Acacia Network, Marvel Architects, Inclusiv, Barrio Electrico, Center for a New Economy, and other organizations.ImageEnterprise Advisors' Erika Ruiz (r) and Enterprise Solutions President Jacqueline Waggoner open the eventEnterprise’s collaboration with housing and community leaders in Puerto Rico dates back to 2001, when we helped finance 158 affordable homes through the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit. Since 2012, Enterprise Advisors has provided technical assistance to local partners and advanced funding opportunities on the Island, further expanding our work after the 2017 hurricanes. This effort, led by Erika Ruiz, senior director at Enterprise Advisors, has developed trust and fostered partnerships with the goal of helping build resilient and equitable communities.The event featured panel discussions and presentations as well as a fireside chat between Enterprise CEO and President Shaun Donovan and LISC President and CEO Michael T. Pugh, moderated by Madeline Fraser Cook, SVP of Community Building and Resilient Solutions at LISC. Their conversation explored the impact of the What’s Possible book and the housing and economic development work needed to build a more sustainable Puerto Rico.“People understand that their homes and their communities are changing, and that we must change along with that,” said Donovan. “So this is a moment of opportunity for this book and the work that it represents to really change practices across the nation and across the globe.” Like Donovan, Pugh emphasized the importance of prioritizing communities with lower incomes: “We've got to be responsive to the communities that will be hit the hardest and have the slowest recovery, in order to help ensure they have a real chance at navigating through this difficult time.”ImagePuerto Rico Disaster Recovery Deputy Secretary Maretzie Díaz (l) shares the stage with HUD Disaster Recovery Coordinating Officer Laura Rivera-CarrionWhile the event speakers highlighted a range of topics, they underscored five common themes key to building on resilience and recovery efforts in Puerto Rico.1. CollaborationPartnerships across nonprofits, government agencies, banks/community-based lenders, and private organizations are necessary for strengthening and preparing Puerto Rico for future climate disasters. Panelists highlighted the representation of organizations and entities from across the Island at the event as an example of the range of sectors that must unite to help Puerto Rico fully recover from the devastation of the most recent hurricanes, as well as to ensure that households across the Island are prepared for future extreme weather events. Increased collaboration will allow every organization to bring their strengths to the table, share best practices, and work together to address the climate challenges.ImageFederal Reserve Bank of New York's Javier Silva and LISC's Madeline Fraser Cook2. PreparationSpeakers emphasized the critical need for Puerto Rico to enhance its preparedness for future climate disasters. Preparation for the growing frequency and intensity of extreme weather events – particularly those exacerbating flooding – requires public education to raise awareness of risks, proactive planning to identify vulnerable critical infrastructure like communications and electricity systems, and fortifying homes and structures across the Island to withstand future disasters.3. Climate AdaptabilityGiven the unpredictable nature of climate disasters, adaptability is essential for housing and climate stakeholders in Puerto Rico to effectively address emerging challenges and build resilience. It is crucial for municipalities and government agencies across the Island to prepare community members for climate hazards and reduce vulnerability by implementing local level changes that ease existing impacts of climate disasters and manage the risks of disasters to come.ImageMichelle Sugden-Castillo (l) moderates panel on Trauma-Informed Design with architect Jonathan Marvel; Dharma Cortés, Harvard; and Acacia Network's Lymaris Albors4. People-Centered Resilience Planning Prioritizing families who are harmed and displaced when disaster strikes in Puerto Rico was a common thread across all event panels and presentations. Panelists discussed involving community members in the development of climate resilience and recovery plans, as well as offering them solutions that go beyond replacing homes with more resilient structures and also help people heal from the trauma of surviving a disaster.5. Financial InvestmentsWithout public and private investments, innovative solutions, necessary preparation, adaptability, and other resilience building efforts would be impossible. Speakers throughout the event discussed the need for increased funding through the Inflation Reduction Act, Community Development Block Grant – Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) allocations, and other sources of federal funds committed to climate resilience. Additionally, panelists highlighted the impact of community development credit unions, or cooperativas, and their ability to drive investments directly to the individuals and families most impacted by disasters.Find more inspiring examples of practical climate and community development solutions that create an equitable path to building strong and resilient communities inWhat’s Possible.Related Topics:ResilienceClimate Risk ReductionAdvisory Services and Technical AssistanceU.S. Caribbean

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‘Just another nail in the coffin for rural areas’: Affordable housing program faces the axe under Trump’s tax, budget cuts 2025-12-28 19:25:38

‘Just another nail in the coffin for rural areas’: Affordable housing program faces the axe under Trump’s tax, budget cuts

Heather Colley and her two children moved four times over five years as they fled high rents in eastern Tennessee, which, like much of rural America, hasn’t been spared from soaring housing costs.Recommended VideoA family gift in 2021 of a small plot of land offered a shot at homeownership, but building a house was beyond reach for the 45-year-old single mother and manicurist making $18.50 an hour.That changed when she qualified for $272,000 from a nonprofit to build a three-bedroom home because of a grant program that has helped make affordable housing possible in rural areas for decades. She moved in last June.“Every time I pull into my garage, I pinch myself,” Colley said.Now, President Donald Trump wants to eliminate that grant, the HOME Investment Partnerships Program, and House Republicans overseeing federal budget negotiations did not include funding for it in their budget proposal. Experts and state housing agencies say that would set back tens of thousands of future affordable housing developments nationwide, particularly hurting Appalachian towns and rural counties where government aid is sparse and investors are few.The program has helped build or repair more than 1.3 million affordable homes in the last three decades, of which at least 540,000 were in congressional districts that are rural or significantly rural, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal data.“Maybe they don’t realize how far-reaching these programs are,” said Colley, who voted for Trump in 2024. Among those half a million homes that HOME helped build, 84% were in districts that voted for him last year, the AP analysis found.“I understand we don’t want excessive spending and wasting taxpayer dollars,” Colley said, “but these proposed budget cuts across the board make me rethink the next time I go to the polls.”The HOME program, started under President George H. W. Bush in the 1990s, survived years of budget battles but has been stretched thin by years of rising construction costs and stagnant funding. That’s meant fewer units, including in some rural areas where home prices have grown faster than in cities.The program has spent more than $38 billion nationwide since it began filling in funding gaps and attracting more investment to acquire, build and repair affordable homes, HUD data shows. Additional funding has gone toward projects that have yet to be finished and rental assistance.HOME’s future is in political limboTo account for the gap left by the proposed cuts, House Republicans want to draw on nearly $5 billion from a related pandemic-era fund that gave states until 2030 to spend on projects supporting people who are unhoused or facing homelessness.That $5 billion, however, may be far less, since many projects haven’t yet been logged into the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s tracking system, according to state housing agencies and associations representing them.A spokesperson for HUD, which administers the program, said HOME isn’t as effective as other programs where the money would be better spent.In opposition to Trump, Senate Republicans have still included funding for HOME in their draft budget. In the coming negotiations, both chambers may compromise and reduce but not terminate HOME’s funding, or extend last years’ overall budget.White House spokesperson Davis Ingle didn’t respond to specific questions from the AP. Instead, Ingle said that Trump’s commitment to cutting red tape is making housing more affordable.A bipartisan group of House lawmakers is working to reduce HOME’s notorious red tape that even proponents say slows construction.Some rural areas are more dependent on HOMEIn Owsley County — one of the nation’s poorest, located in the rural Kentucky hills — residents struggle in an economy blighted by coal mine closures and declining tobacco crop revenues.Affordable homes are needed there, but tough to build in a region that doesn’t attract larger-scale rental developments that federal dollars typically go toward.That’s where HOME comes in, said Cassie Hudson, who runs Partnership Housing in Owsley, which has relied on the program to build the majority of its affordable homes for at least a dozen years.A lack of additional funding for HOME has already made it hard to keep up with construction costs, Hudson said, and the organization builds a quarter of the single-family homes it used to.“Particularly for deeply rural places and persistent poverty counties, local housing developers are the only way homes and new rental housing gets built,” said Joshua Stewart of Fahe, a coalition of Appalachian nonprofits.That’s in part because investment is scant and HOME steps in when construction costs exceed what a home can be sold for — a common barrier in poor areas of Appalachia. Some developers use the profits to build more affordable units. Its loss would erode those nonprofits’ ability to build affordable homes in years to come, Stewart said.One of those nonprofits, Housing Development Alliance, helped Tiffany Mullins in Hazard, Kentucky, which was ravaged by floods. Mullins, a single mother of four who makes $14.30 an hour at Walmart, bought a house there thanks to HOME funding and moved in August.Mullins sees the program as preserving a rural way of life, recalling when folks owned homes and land “with gardens, we had chickens, cows. Now you don’t see much of that.”It’s a long-term impactIn congressional budget negotiations, HOME is an easier target than programs such as vouchers because most people would not immediately lose their housing, said Tess Hembree, executive director of the Council of State Community Development Agencies.The effect of any reduction would instead be felt in a fizzling of new affordable housing supply. When HOME funding was temporarily reduced to $900 million in 2015, “10 to 15 years later, we’re seeing the ramifications,” Hembree said.That includes affordable units built in cities. The biggest program that funds affordable rental housing nationwide, the Low Income Housing Tax Credit, uses HOME grants for 12% of units, totaling 324,000 current individual units, according to soon-to-be-published Urban Institute research.Trump’s spending bill that Republicans passed this summer increased LITHC, but experts say further reducing or cutting HOME would make those credits less usable.“It’s LITHC plus HOME, usually,” said Tim Thrasher, CEO of Community Action Partnership of North Alabama, which builds affordable apartments for some of the nation’s poorest.In the lush mountains of eastern West Virginia, Woodlands Development Group relies on HOME for its smaller rural projects. Because it helps people with a wider range of incomes, HOME is “one of the only programs available to us that allows us to develop true workforce housing,” said executive director Dave Clark.It’s those workers — nurses, first responders, teachers — that nonprofits like east Tennessee’s Creative Compassion use HOME to build for. With the program in jeopardy, grant administrator Sarah Halcott said she fears for her clients battling rising housing costs.“This is just another nail in the coffin for rural areas,” Halcott said.___Kramon reported from Atlanta. Bedayn reported from Denver. Herbst contributed from New York City, and Kessler reported from Washington, D.C.___Kramon is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.Join us at the Fortune Workplace Innovation SummitMay 19–20, 2026, in Atlanta. The next era of workplace innovation is here—and the old playbook is being rewritten. At this exclusive, high-energy event, the world’s most innovative leaders will convene to explore how AI, humanity, and strategy converge to redefine, again, the future of work. Register now.

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What Will the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ Mean for Affordable Housing, Communities? 2026-01-24 21:45:41

What Will the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ Mean for Affordable Housing, Communities?

It’s hard to find someone — even outside Washington, D.C. — who hasn’t heard about the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA, H.R. 1(link is external)), which President Trump signed(link is external) into law on July 4. The sweeping legislation, one of the most consequential in decades, narrowly made its way through Congress and contains a wide range of tax changes and federal funding cuts. As advocates for affordable housing and community development, Enterprise is carefully analyzing the final provisions to assess their impact on the communities we serve.Most of the public attention has focused on the bill’s steep cuts to Medicaid, but OBBBA also includes historic investments in key tax credits long championed by Enterprise and our partners — including the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (Housing Credit), New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC), and Opportunity Zones (OZs). At the same time, the bill deals a significant blow to climate policy, sharply phasing out clean energy tax credits from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and repealing the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF), despite strong bipartisan support for their preservation.While the legislation contains many provisions we oppose, there are meaningful wins that will support the development of affordable housing and direct critical investments to underserved communities. These include the largest expansion of the Housing Credit since 2000 and the permanent extension of the NMTC after years of short-term renewals and expirations.The path to enactment was far from smooth. The House passed the initial version of OBBBA by a razor-thin margin of 215–214 just before Memorial Day. As expected, the Senate made substantial changes to secure enough Republican votes without losing the House majority’s support. The Senate ultimately passed its version 51–50, with Vice President J.D. Vance casting the tie-breaking vote after Republicans Susan Collins (Maine), Rand Paul (Ky.), and Thom Tillis (N.C.) joined all Democrats in opposition. Despite concerns among some House Republicans, the chamber approved the revised Senate bill 218–214 on July 3, with Reps. Thomas Massie (Ky.-4) and Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.-1) voting no alongside all Democrats.Below, we break down what the OBBBA means for several of Enterprise’s top policy priorities.Low-Income Housing Tax Credit: A Historic Boost for Affordable Housing ProductionThe Housing Credit is the nation’s most important tool for building and preserving affordable rental homes. Since it was created in 1986, it has helped finance over 4 million homes for low-income families, seniors, and people with disabilities.After years of bipartisan advocacy, two major provisions from the Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act(link is external) were included in the final reconciliation package, delivering the most significant expansion of the Housing Credit in over two decades:A permanent 12% increase in Housing Credit allocations, which helps states finance more affordable rental housing projects every yearA permanent reduction in the “50% test” to 25%, which will make it much easier to finance affordable homes using tax-exempt bonds, unlocking more projects that previously didn’t pencil outAccording to estimates(link is external) from Novogradac, these changes could result in the financing of 1.22 million additional affordable rental homes over the next 10 years. That’s a game-changer for our field—and a huge win for communities nationwide.While these victories are historic, the final law didn’t include several other key proposals from the House bill, like temporary boosts in support for affordable housing in rural and tribal communities. We will continue working to advance those provisions(link is external) and others from the AHCIA.The legislation also includes indirect wins for affordable housing finance. For example, it makes 100% bonus depreciation permanent, which may improve investor interest in Housing Credit projects. Importantly, the final law does not include a proposed tax provision that would have disrupted international investment in affordable housing projects—a relief for many developers and investors.New Markets Tax Credit: Permanently Supporting Community DevelopmentAnother major win: the reconciliation bill makes the NMTC permanent. For more than 20 years, this credit has fueled economic development in communities that have historically lacked investment—generating more than $143 billion in total investment and creating over 1.2 million jobs.Until now, the NMTC has been reauthorized every few years—occasionally with lapses and retroactive legislative action—creating uncertainty for the communities and investors who rely on it. Permanency means we can plan for the long term. The NMTC Coalition projects that this change will lead to $100 billion in new investment and over 400,000 permanent full-time jobs in underserved communities.While the bill locks in NMTC’s $5 billion annual authorization, it doesn’t include two long-sought improvements: indexing the credit to inflation and allowing investors to use it against alternative minimum tax (AMT) liability. These are priorities we’ll continue to push for as part of the New Markets Tax Credit Extension Act(link is external).Opportunity Zones: Permanency and Rural Focus, But More Work AheadThe Opportunity Zones (OZ) incentive, created in 2017 to spur investment in underserved areas, is now a permanent part of the tax code. The OBBBA also included provisions that deepen targeting and promote rural equity.To help ensure the incentive reaches the communities that need it most, the bill tightens eligibility by lowering the income threshold for designation: now only neighborhoods with incomes at or below 70% of the area median will qualify (down from 80%). It also creates a new category of Rural Opportunity Zones and establishes Rural Qualified Opportunity Funds with enhanced benefits. For example:Investors in OZs still get a 10% step-up in tax basis if they hold their investments for five years.In rural OZs, the step-up is even greater—30% for those same five-year investments.Rural OZ projects also benefit from a lower “substantial improvement” requirement—50% rather than the previous 100%.Another important advancement: the bill includes data collection, reporting, and transparency requirements for Opportunity Zones, along with $15 million for the IRS to implement them. This is a step toward more accountability and better targeting of investments.However, we’re disappointed that many key proposals to better align OZs with affordable housing, NMTC, and community development financial institutions (CDFIs) were not included. Enterprise has long raised concerns that OZs have not effectively delivered for affordable housing, and most of our recommendations to fix that were left out. There are industry efforts to explore other regulatory and administrative actions that could improve the use of OZs in producing and preserving affordable housing.Still, the transparency provisions and permanency are meaningful steps forward, and we will continue advocating for improvements in all communities.Energy Efficiency and RenewablesIn recent years, many LIHTC developers integrated IRA energy credits into their capital stacks. This allowed developers to invest in more comprehensive energy efficiency and renewable energy measures, leading to long term energy savings for both building owners and residents. Under the OBBBA, most of these credits will be phased out within a year.Developers have already begun to revise scopes and seek gap funding for projects in their pipelines that relied on the New Energy Efficient Home (45L) or the Energy Efficient Commercial Buildings Deduction (179D) credits. In the case of 45L, buildings will have to be built, sold/leased, and Energy Star certified by July 2026. For 179D, projects would have to begin construction by July 2026. While the Investment Tax Credit (48E) for solar and wind also faces a much earlier phaseout, the runway is a bit longer. To qualify for the credit, projects must begin construction by July 4, 2026 and placed-in-service by the end of 2027.  Beginning in 2026, there are also additional requirements related to “Foreign Entity of Concern” (FEOC) restrictions. Currently, the definition of “commence construction” requires at least 5% of project costs to be expended, but a recent Executive Order(link is external)  suggests that may be revised.The repeal of the underlying statute and rescission of unobligated funds for the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) is another provision that concerns affordable housing developers. Many developers are primed to apply for and integrate this critical funding into projects to ensure energy affordability and healthy living for their residents. Enterprise is part of the Power Forward Communities(link is external) coalition which received a GGRF award. While 99%+ of GGRF funds are officially obligated, the program is currently tied up in litigation. We expect that the future of the program and access to funds will be determined by the courts.  Amendments FiledOver 500 amendments to the bill were filed in the Senate. The vast majority of them were filed by Democrats, and either failed or were not even voted on. Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), who is a close ally and frequent partner, offered an amendment to include the 30% rural basis boost, but it did not receive a vote. We worked with Senate Republicans, including Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), to broaden support for key clean energy tax credits(link is external), emphasizing the impact of 45L and the ICT on LIHTC deals. The same is true for the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. While there was support, these efforts did not prevail.Overall, this bill is a big step forward for low-income communities, but our work is not done. The bill is not related to FY26 appropriations, which funds and authorizes appropriated programs such as HOME, CDBG, and Section 4. According to the National Council of State Housing Agencies, an average of 16.9% of Housing Credit units receive HOME funding, and an average of 51% of HOME units receive Housing Credit funding.Without robust funding of the HOME program, the Housing Credit provisions in the reconciliation bill will be inefficient at increasing the housing supply. Our advocacy team remains hard at work in the FY26 appropriations process. We look forward to seeing what legislative and regulatory opportunities can make the expansions of the Housing Credit and NMTC, as well as the expansion of OZs, strengthen affordable housing production and preservation.Related Topics:Low-Income Housing Tax CreditNew Markets Tax CreditPolicy

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An Affordable Housing and Climate Victory in Sacramento

An Affordable Housing and Climate Victory in Sacramento

By Jane Jones  -  2026-01-17 04:22:31

Berkeley Way and the Hope Center. Photo By Bruce DamonteIn a significant policy win with far-reaching implications for housing and climate equity, California lawmakers reauthorized the state’s cap-and-trade program—now renamed cap and invest. The move not only extends the state’s signature climate policy but also guarantees a dedicated stream of funding for affordable housing and sustainable transportation.The legislation ensures that a key program, Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC), will now receive $800 million annually through 2045. This long-term funding commitment provides stability for one of California’s most important housing and climate programs, which to date has invested $4 billion in affordable housing and transit and reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 5.7 million metric tons.The Legislature passed the reauthorization through Assembly Bill 1207(link is external) and Senate Bill 840(link is external) on September 13, both of which Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law on September 19. AB 1207 extends and makes minor adjustments to the cap-and-invest program mechanism, including topics such as free allowances, offsets, price ceilings, climate credits, program administration, and oversight. Meanwhile, SB 840 focuses exclusively on the funding allocation plan for dollars generated by the cap-and-invest auctions, also known as the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF).   Our team is proud to have worked with housing, transportation, and environmental partners up and down the state to advocate for AHSC funding, as well as for funding for two core sustainable transportation programs: the Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program (TIRCP) and the Low Carbon Transit Operations Program (LCTOP), which will receive $400 and $200 million annually, respectively. Enterprise advocated fiercely for these programs, and our team was thrilled to stand with 50+ partners in support of this funding deal.The Deal DetailsThe final deal struck by the Legislature and the Governor makes several changes to how the cap-and-invest dollars will be spent, detailed in Senate Bill 840, including how funds will flow to the AHSC program. Previously, proceeds from cap-and-trade auctions were allocated to programs through the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF), and AHSC received a standing 20 percent of the GGRF each year, which fluctuated with annual cap-and-trade proceeds. With this new agreement, AHSC will instead receive a flat amount of $800 million annually, subject to a detailed waterfall of funding.   Specifically, beginning in the 2026–2027 fiscal year, the GGRF funds will be allocated in the following priority order.First, to fund a variety of prior legislative commitments related to fire prevention, manufacturing, and legislative oversight of the cap-and-invest program (estimated to be less than $250 million).Second, to provide $1 billion for high-speed rail.Third, to provide $1 billion for Legislature-determined priorities each year.Fourth, to provide specific dollar allocations for the following programs:$800 million for AHSC$400 million for TIRCP$250 million for community air protection programs$200 million for LCTOP$200 million for other fire prevention programs$130 million for safe drinking waterImageAHSC Impact, Rounds 1 - 8 SB 840 also states that if there is a year when the cap-and-trade proceeds are insufficient to cover the full suite of programs, prior legislative commitments, high-speed rail, and legislature priorities – items (a), (b), and (c) –  will be funded first, and the other programs – programs under (d) – will receive proportional reductions, as determined by the Department of Finance. There are benefits and drawbacks to this funding structure as it pertains to the AHSC program. AHSC is now lower in the funding order and stands the risk of receiving less funding if the cap-and-invest auctions proceed poorly. Additionally, AHSC will not automatically benefit from a surge in cap-and-invest proceeds if the auctions perform especially well. However, AHSC has always been subject to fluctuations in auctions, and the $800 million allocation is more than AHSC has often received historically.Telling the Story of AHSCImageWinning substantial, sustained funding for AHSC was the result of persistent advocacy from Enterprise and a broad coalition of partners. The advocacy over the past nine months focused on telling the story of the AHSC program, highlighting its significant contributions to greenhouse gas emission reductions, and elevating its impacts on low-income communities across California. With a new cohort of legislators and staff, it was critical to educate members and their teams on the AHSC program, including its purpose, funding, and role in advancing the state’s climate, housing, and equity goals.  Each year, Enterprise and the California Housing Partnership(link is external) release an annual AHSC impact report to quantify the program's impact. As discussed in the report, housing and transportation contribute around one-third of California’s GHG emissions. To help mitigate this, AHSC funds infill affordable housing development paired with sustainable transportation and climate investments.These transformative developments encourage residents to take advantage of accessible public transit and bike and pedestrian infrastructure, minimizing the use of cars and reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the process. This shift in development and land use patterns decreases reliance on driving while connecting residents to amenities, services, and economic opportunities.  ImageAHSC Awards: Senate District 16 - Senator Melissa Hurtado: This district map shows the awarded AHSC developments within Senate District 16 in the San Joaquin Valley. One powerful advocacy tool developed this year was AHSC profiles for specific legislative districts. These profiles showcased the program’s local impacts and were crucial for educating staff and cultivating champions within the Legislature. Profiles that highlighted completed AHSC developments helped to ground our advocacy by making program investments more tangible.These district profiles also helped highlight how the program benefits communities across the state and is flexible enough to meet the needs of California’s diverse geography – from rural areas of the Central Valley to the urban centers of the Bay Area and Los Angeles.  Every meeting, phone call, email, site visit, and social media post from our partners across the state contributed to our mission to make the AHSC program undeniable — and we achieved that goal. We are deeply grateful to our partners who worked with us tirelessly in this effort.What Comes NextAlongside our partners, we will continue to stay engaged in Sacramento as the cap-and-invest agreement moves forward. We will track any potential follow-up legislation and how the cap-and-invest auctions perform once the legislation goes into effect. We will also advocate for any additional funding for AHSC, should that be necessary.   In the meantime, we join our partners in celebrating this important win for affordable housing, sustainable transportation, and our broader climate and equity goals for California.Related Topics:Policy Northern CaliforniaSouthern California

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A Plan to Simplify Housing in California

A Plan to Simplify Housing in California

By Jane Jones  -  2026-01-04 12:22:08

The goal of the Governor's Reorganization Plan is to usher in structural changes needed in California to streamline funding programs and to improve coordination across housing and homelessness policies.On July 5, Governor Gavin Newsom’s Reorganization Plan(link is external) (GRP) went into effect with the goal of ushering in the structural changes needed in California to effectively address the affordable housing and homelessness crisis.The GRP divides the California Business, Consumer Services and Housing Agency into two agencies—the California Housing and Homelessness Agency (CHHA) and the Business and Consumer Services Agency—so that housing functions and authorities (such as multifamily affordable housing lending, and homelessness programming) are consolidated into a single agency and consumer services (such as business licensing and cannabis regulation) in another.For housing, the GRP attempts to streamline state housing funding programs, better coordinate homelessness and housing policy, and initiate the cultural changes needed to foster stronger partnerships with housing stakeholders—affordable housing developers, financial institutions, local housing agencies, advocates—to meet the state’s housing goals.“This bold plan shows we are being more aggressive in prioritizing change for the better,” Secretary of the Business, Consumer Services, and Housing Agency Tomiquia Moss said in a news release from the governor’s office(link is external). “This will enable us to better reach our goal of 2.5 million new homes by 2030, with one million of them being affordable housing.”Streamlining the ProcessA recent commentary co-authored by Enterprise Community Partners and the Terner Center for Housing Innovation at UC Berkeley(link is external) outlines how the current affordable housing finance system at the state level is challenged with fragmentation, inefficiency, and duplication because of the multiple agencies and departments awarding affordable housing funding and overseeing compliance.An affordable housing development typically requires four to six funding sources, with each source having unique and separate requirements for applications, scoring/evaluation, compliance/reporting, and inspection.An affordable housing developer often applies for several rounds of funding before all the needed funding is secured including tax credits and bonds awarded at the last step. After construction, the annual monitoring and compliance process is also duplicative with the state often requesting the same information for each funding source. According to the Terner Center, this fragmentation is costly and inefficient,(link is external) adding, on average, a four-month delay to construction and increasing the cost by $20,460 per unit in total development costs for every additional public funding source.Affordable housing developers, the primary users of the system, are seeking a more streamlined process where applying and securing funding for affordable housing developments can happen at once from the various state programs versus the drawn-out process described above. This means fully awarding affordable housing developments with all the needed state funding and then guaranteeing the award of tax credits and bonds. Affordable housing developers are also seeking to eliminate lengthy closings and redundant compliance reporting.  The GRP begins to lay the groundwork for full consolidation of the state’s affordable housing finance system, which is necessary for a desired streamlined and predictable process. The GRP  first addresses the fragmentation by restructuring the affordable housing finance system so it is more similar to other states where housing finance functions are consolidated into one or two agencies.“Many other states administer their affordable housing financing through their housing finance agency or have otherwise sought to consolidate and streamline their affordable housing funding system. California is somewhat unique in that the responsibility for awarding affordable housing is spread across two separate constitutional officers,” said Sarah Karlinsky, Director of Research and Policy for the Terner Center for Housing Innovation.  Key Changes Under the PlanThe main housing components of the GRP outlined in the statute(link is external) include:California Housing and Homelessness Agency (CHHA)–The entities that sit within CHHA will include the Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD), the California Housing Finance Agency (CalHFA), the Civil Rights Department, the California Interagency Council on Homelessness, and the newly created Housing Development and Finance Committee.Housing Development and Finance Committee (HDFC)–The statute creates the HDFC to centralize affordable housing funding programs under the Governor’s purview, which are currently scattered across multiple departments. These programs include but are not limited to:Joe Serna, Jr. Farmworker Housing Grant ProgramMultifamily Housing ProgramInfill Incentive Grant ProgramInfill Infrastructure Grant ProgramTransit-Oriented Development Implementation ProgramHousing for a Healthy California ProgramVeterans Housing and Homeless Prevention ActAffordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (portion currently administered by HCD at the direction of the Strategic Growth Council). The executive director of HDFC reports to an executive committee that consists of the Secretary of CHHA, the HCD Director, and the executive director of CalHFA. The executive director can also appoint a general counsel who can assist with streamlining the awards process, particularly closings. The activities under HDFC’s authority include:Create a consolidated applicationfor multifamily affordable housing funding programs (this is currently underway through the AB 519 Affordable Housing Finance Working Group tasked with creating a “One Stop Shop” for funding programs)Create a process to fund awardsfor the multifamily affordable housing funding programs that includes accepting, reviewing, and scoring applications and providing recommendations on awardsEstablish timelinesfor the allocation of awards to streamline program funding, minimize delays, and facilitate simultaneous awards across state government if possibleDevelop an appeals processfor program qualification and scoring adjustmentsMonitor the administrationof affordable housing finance programs and make recommendations to improve alignment and administration of those programs including recommendations for CalHFAStreamline the compliance monitoringof affordable multifamily rental housing developments that are subject to a regulatory agreement with more than one state entityProduce an annual report(similar to the California Tax Credit Allocation Committee report) that includes the total amount of funding, the total number of units assisted by income level, and the amount of funding awarded to each projectStakeholder Outreach– To implement this restructure, the GRP calls for the outreach to the following stakeholders: Department of Housing and Community Development, the California Housing Finance Agency, TCAC, the California Debt Limit Allocation Committee, nonprofit affordable housing developers, for-profit affordable housing developers, local governments, and tribal governments.Alignment with other Agencies and State Funding– CHHA is directed to coordinate and align with the Transportation Agency and Health and Human Services Agency’s policies, programs, and funding to achieve the state’s housing priorities and maximize public resources. This may eventually include shifting programs with a strong housing component to CHHA. HDFC is specifically empowered to look across all state agencies to identify and align relevant funding opportunities that could fall under CHHA’s authority.The state budget includes $4.2 million in 2025-26 for the restructure and creation of CHHA(link is external) and a commitment of $6.4 million in 2026-27 and $6.2 million in 2027-28. The restructure will go into effect on July 1, 2026.Progress Toward a Simpler SystemIt is important to note that a critical piece to the state’s affordable housing finance system that is not included in the GRP is the consolidation of tax credits and bonds. Tax credits and bonds are issued by the state treasurer and not within the GRP restructure since those authorities are outside of the governor’s powers. Despite not having tax credits and bonds, the GRP will still greatly improve the system in terms of transparency and efficiency while reducing duplication. The next step is to figure out how to incorporate tax credits and bonds into a streamlined awards process.The centralization of the state’s affordable housing funding programs with the oversight of these programs by the Housing Development and Finance Committee begins to lay the ground for full consolidation of the state’s affordable housing finance system as well as brings forth the change management and staff retraining needed for new systems. Most importantly, the restructure will foster partnerships with housing stakeholders who share the common goal of ending housing insecurity and homelessness for everyone in California. Earlier this spring, Enterprise played an active role in advocating for the GRP by organizing and participating in a range of efforts—including focus groups, coalition work, and public testimony before the Little Hoover Commission and Assembly hearings. As implementation moves forward, we remain committed to partnering with the state and housing stakeholders to help shape an effective and streamlined affordable housing finance system for California.Related Topics:Policy Northern CaliforniaSouthern California

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A Lifetime of Building Community in New Orleans

A Lifetime of Building Community in New Orleans

By Jane Smith  -  2026-01-08 21:02:50

Emelda Paul was 23 when she moved to a new apartment just a few blocks and “over the tracks” from her childhood home. She had three young daughters, and Lafitte — the public housing complex in New Orleans’ storied Tremé neighborhood — felt like the perfect place to raise a family. Nearly 70 years later, Paul calls herself a lifetime Lafitte resident, even after the bricks of the original buildings have been replaced with colorful rows of townhomes built to mirror New Orleans architectural style to become Faubourg Lafitte. In August of 2005, Hurricane Katrina upended her life and sent her to Arizona temporarily, but the story of Lafitte and the arc of Paul’s life have continued to intersect to this day. Even after the original Lafitte was demolished and redeveloped, she moved back and continued to play an active role in the community.“People from New Orleans are resilient. We bounce back,” Paul said in a recent interview. “We fall down, but we get up.”Early YearsEmelda Paul was born 91 years ago, not far from her current apartment at Faubourg Lafitte in the Treme neighborhood. Not long after, the first residents moved into newly constructed public housing known as “Lafitte Place.” ImageFamily photos line the walls of Paul's Faubourg Lafitte apartmentPaul and her grandmother had moved to the St. Bernard Housing, where she lived until she started a family of her own. “When I heard I could apply to live at Lafitte, I did just that,” Paul said.Raising a FamilyAt 23, Paul was overjoyed after moving to Lafitte with her three young daughters. “We lived right here on Roman Street in one of the original buildings, and we loved it,” Paul said. “In the early days at Lafitte, we all worked together.”Paul says she and her family spent so much at time at the park (now the Greenway), that people called it “Miss Emelda Park.” She tended to her garden, sat on her porch to socialize with neighbors, and jumped in to help with neighborhood issues whenever she could.ImagePaul returned to the Tremé neighborhood after Katrina“My family used the park at Lafitte all the time,” she said. That continued even after she became a grandmother. “Whenever the lights would go out, my grandson’s friends would say ‘go tell Miss Mel the lights are out in the park.’ In other words, I was the type of person to make sure things in the neighborhood were working.”Up until Hurricane Katrina, 2,000 residents including 800 children lived at Lafitte. Now, construction has begun on the last redevelopment phase.Katrina Hits“I was sitting in the kitchen and my daughter and her friends were out on the porch. The water was rising, but I said, ‘we’re not going anywhere.’” Soon though, cars were floating by outside Paul’s window, and she realized it was time to go. She and her family walked along the Interstate, eventually ending up at her other daughter’s home, and then the airport.ImageLeaving New OrleansPaul flew to Arizona, where she stayed with a granddaughter who lived there. “We were all taken out of our comfort zones and living in strange places where they called us ‘refugees.’ “She ended up spending two years in Arizona, joining a local choir, attending city council meetings, and “getting involved in almost everything,” including organizing a local Mardi Gras celebration. Still, Arizona didn’t feel like home and Paul and her family made plans to return to New Orleans.Demolition of Lafitte While Paul was away, she was upset to find out that the Lafitte was sealed up and slated for demolition. She recognizes though that even before Katrina, the Lafitte buildings had fallen into disrepair. “Maybe it was time for us to move because those bricks were deteriorating and there were a lot of things that needed to be repaired. And they were being neglected.” Once Paul had packed up a U-Haul and ventured home, she moved into a senior community on the West Bank in New Orleans.Redevelopment and rebuildingMy name is Emelda Paul. I was a 30-year resident of Lafitte and I am the president of the Lafitte Residents Council. I am here because I want our people, our families to return home to New Orleans. testimony before Congress in September of 2007After HUD and HANO announced the decision to demolish the “Big Four” New Orleans public housing developments, the agencies selected Enterprise and Providence (L&M Development was eventually added to the team) to redevelop Lafitte. Paul was one resident who spoke out in favor of the plan to rebuild. “I had to do a lot of testifying and a lot of talking,” including a trip to Washington, D. C. to testify before Congress on the need for redevelopment and improvements in the new Lafitte.Enterprise and Providence agreed to three core commitments as they began the redevelopment process: Listening to community voices during the redevelopment process, giving the 865 former Lafitte families and individuals the opportunity and first priority to return home, building 900 subsidized, affordable homes as part of a mixed-income community on and around the site.Back at HomeOn a recent warm and steamy August day, Emelda Paul shared her story at an event where local leaders and community members gathered to celebrate the groundbreaking of the last redevelopment phase on the footprint of the former public housing site at Faubourg Lafitte. This phase will continue to advance the development of the former Lafitte public housing site, a process that began 18 years ago.ImagePaul loves her Faubourg Lafitte apartment where she has lived for over a decade now, a place that is filled with family photos and a lifetime of mementos. “I can look right out on the Mardi Gras from here,” she said. “The only thing I miss is the porch where I used to spend so much time.”At 91, Paul is still active in the community, volunteers at a local hospital, and is in regular contact with management when she sees any problems. “I get along with management and with residents.” There have been some recent disagreements; a younger couple nearby plays loud music and some residents have complained. “I say they can play their music. Look, I was young once too,” she said. “So, I let them play their music and I close my door and it’s fine. What’s important is that we still look out for each other.”Related Topics:Gulf Coast

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From Recovery to Resilience in Puerto Rico: Five Key Takeaways

From Recovery to Resilience in Puerto Rico: Five Key Takeaways

By David Jones  -  2026-01-21 12:15:43

The people of Puerto Rico have endured significant losses in recent years due to climate change- induced disasters, including Hurricanes Maria and Irma. From frequent storms that accelerate flooding to heat waves that make everyday tasks challenging, stakeholders across Puerto Rico continue to pursue innovative strategies to rebuild, recover, and ensure that the lowest-income households are not left behind in the aftermath of extreme weather events.Puerto Rico’s commitment to community-driven solutions was palpable when Enterprise, LISC, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York capped off 2024 with an event in San Juan that gathered housing and climate experts working on both the Island and the mainland.The event, “Recovery to Resilience: Collaborative Solutions for a Sustainable Puerto Rico,” highlighted strategies and initiatives from the book What’s Possible: Investing NOW for Prosperous, Sustainable Neighborhoods, as well as programs and innovations led by the Puerto Rico Department of Housing, HUD, Acacia Network, Marvel Architects, Inclusiv, Barrio Electrico, Center for a New Economy, and other organizations.ImageEnterprise Advisors' Erika Ruiz (r) and Enterprise Solutions President Jacqueline Waggoner open the eventEnterprise’s collaboration with housing and community leaders in Puerto Rico dates back to 2001, when we helped finance 158 affordable homes through the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit. Since 2012, Enterprise Advisors has provided technical assistance to local partners and advanced funding opportunities on the Island, further expanding our work after the 2017 hurricanes. This effort, led by Erika Ruiz, senior director at Enterprise Advisors, has developed trust and fostered partnerships with the goal of helping build resilient and equitable communities.The event featured panel discussions and presentations as well as a fireside chat between Enterprise CEO and President Shaun Donovan and LISC President and CEO Michael T. Pugh, moderated by Madeline Fraser Cook, SVP of Community Building and Resilient Solutions at LISC. Their conversation explored the impact of the What’s Possible book and the housing and economic development work needed to build a more sustainable Puerto Rico.“People understand that their homes and their communities are changing, and that we must change along with that,” said Donovan. “So this is a moment of opportunity for this book and the work that it represents to really change practices across the nation and across the globe.” Like Donovan, Pugh emphasized the importance of prioritizing communities with lower incomes: “We've got to be responsive to the communities that will be hit the hardest and have the slowest recovery, in order to help ensure they have a real chance at navigating through this difficult time.”ImagePuerto Rico Disaster Recovery Deputy Secretary Maretzie Díaz (l) shares the stage with HUD Disaster Recovery Coordinating Officer Laura Rivera-CarrionWhile the event speakers highlighted a range of topics, they underscored five common themes key to building on resilience and recovery efforts in Puerto Rico.1. CollaborationPartnerships across nonprofits, government agencies, banks/community-based lenders, and private organizations are necessary for strengthening and preparing Puerto Rico for future climate disasters. Panelists highlighted the representation of organizations and entities from across the Island at the event as an example of the range of sectors that must unite to help Puerto Rico fully recover from the devastation of the most recent hurricanes, as well as to ensure that households across the Island are prepared for future extreme weather events. Increased collaboration will allow every organization to bring their strengths to the table, share best practices, and work together to address the climate challenges.ImageFederal Reserve Bank of New York's Javier Silva and LISC's Madeline Fraser Cook2. PreparationSpeakers emphasized the critical need for Puerto Rico to enhance its preparedness for future climate disasters. Preparation for the growing frequency and intensity of extreme weather events – particularly those exacerbating flooding – requires public education to raise awareness of risks, proactive planning to identify vulnerable critical infrastructure like communications and electricity systems, and fortifying homes and structures across the Island to withstand future disasters.3. Climate AdaptabilityGiven the unpredictable nature of climate disasters, adaptability is essential for housing and climate stakeholders in Puerto Rico to effectively address emerging challenges and build resilience. It is crucial for municipalities and government agencies across the Island to prepare community members for climate hazards and reduce vulnerability by implementing local level changes that ease existing impacts of climate disasters and manage the risks of disasters to come.ImageMichelle Sugden-Castillo (l) moderates panel on Trauma-Informed Design with architect Jonathan Marvel; Dharma Cortés, Harvard; and Acacia Network's Lymaris Albors4. People-Centered Resilience Planning Prioritizing families who are harmed and displaced when disaster strikes in Puerto Rico was a common thread across all event panels and presentations. Panelists discussed involving community members in the development of climate resilience and recovery plans, as well as offering them solutions that go beyond replacing homes with more resilient structures and also help people heal from the trauma of surviving a disaster.5. Financial InvestmentsWithout public and private investments, innovative solutions, necessary preparation, adaptability, and other resilience building efforts would be impossible. Speakers throughout the event discussed the need for increased funding through the Inflation Reduction Act, Community Development Block Grant – Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) allocations, and other sources of federal funds committed to climate resilience. Additionally, panelists highlighted the impact of community development credit unions, or cooperativas, and their ability to drive investments directly to the individuals and families most impacted by disasters.Find more inspiring examples of practical climate and community development solutions that create an equitable path to building strong and resilient communities inWhat’s Possible.Related Topics:ResilienceClimate Risk ReductionAdvisory Services and Technical AssistanceU.S. Caribbean

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What Will the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ Mean for Affordable Housing, Communities?

What Will the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ Mean for Affordable Housing, Communities?

By Robert Miller  -  2026-01-24 21:45:41

It’s hard to find someone — even outside Washington, D.C. — who hasn’t heard about the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA, H.R. 1(link is external)), which President Trump signed(link is external) into law on July 4. The sweeping legislation, one of the most consequential in decades, narrowly made its way through Congress and contains a wide range of tax changes and federal funding cuts. As advocates for affordable housing and community development, Enterprise is carefully analyzing the final provisions to assess their impact on the communities we serve.Most of the public attention has focused on the bill’s steep cuts to Medicaid, but OBBBA also includes historic investments in key tax credits long championed by Enterprise and our partners — including the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (Housing Credit), New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC), and Opportunity Zones (OZs). At the same time, the bill deals a significant blow to climate policy, sharply phasing out clean energy tax credits from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and repealing the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF), despite strong bipartisan support for their preservation.While the legislation contains many provisions we oppose, there are meaningful wins that will support the development of affordable housing and direct critical investments to underserved communities. These include the largest expansion of the Housing Credit since 2000 and the permanent extension of the NMTC after years of short-term renewals and expirations.The path to enactment was far from smooth. The House passed the initial version of OBBBA by a razor-thin margin of 215–214 just before Memorial Day. As expected, the Senate made substantial changes to secure enough Republican votes without losing the House majority’s support. The Senate ultimately passed its version 51–50, with Vice President J.D. Vance casting the tie-breaking vote after Republicans Susan Collins (Maine), Rand Paul (Ky.), and Thom Tillis (N.C.) joined all Democrats in opposition. Despite concerns among some House Republicans, the chamber approved the revised Senate bill 218–214 on July 3, with Reps. Thomas Massie (Ky.-4) and Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.-1) voting no alongside all Democrats.Below, we break down what the OBBBA means for several of Enterprise’s top policy priorities.Low-Income Housing Tax Credit: A Historic Boost for Affordable Housing ProductionThe Housing Credit is the nation’s most important tool for building and preserving affordable rental homes. Since it was created in 1986, it has helped finance over 4 million homes for low-income families, seniors, and people with disabilities.After years of bipartisan advocacy, two major provisions from the Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act(link is external) were included in the final reconciliation package, delivering the most significant expansion of the Housing Credit in over two decades:A permanent 12% increase in Housing Credit allocations, which helps states finance more affordable rental housing projects every yearA permanent reduction in the “50% test” to 25%, which will make it much easier to finance affordable homes using tax-exempt bonds, unlocking more projects that previously didn’t pencil outAccording to estimates(link is external) from Novogradac, these changes could result in the financing of 1.22 million additional affordable rental homes over the next 10 years. That’s a game-changer for our field—and a huge win for communities nationwide.While these victories are historic, the final law didn’t include several other key proposals from the House bill, like temporary boosts in support for affordable housing in rural and tribal communities. We will continue working to advance those provisions(link is external) and others from the AHCIA.The legislation also includes indirect wins for affordable housing finance. For example, it makes 100% bonus depreciation permanent, which may improve investor interest in Housing Credit projects. Importantly, the final law does not include a proposed tax provision that would have disrupted international investment in affordable housing projects—a relief for many developers and investors.New Markets Tax Credit: Permanently Supporting Community DevelopmentAnother major win: the reconciliation bill makes the NMTC permanent. For more than 20 years, this credit has fueled economic development in communities that have historically lacked investment—generating more than $143 billion in total investment and creating over 1.2 million jobs.Until now, the NMTC has been reauthorized every few years—occasionally with lapses and retroactive legislative action—creating uncertainty for the communities and investors who rely on it. Permanency means we can plan for the long term. The NMTC Coalition projects that this change will lead to $100 billion in new investment and over 400,000 permanent full-time jobs in underserved communities.While the bill locks in NMTC’s $5 billion annual authorization, it doesn’t include two long-sought improvements: indexing the credit to inflation and allowing investors to use it against alternative minimum tax (AMT) liability. These are priorities we’ll continue to push for as part of the New Markets Tax Credit Extension Act(link is external).Opportunity Zones: Permanency and Rural Focus, But More Work AheadThe Opportunity Zones (OZ) incentive, created in 2017 to spur investment in underserved areas, is now a permanent part of the tax code. The OBBBA also included provisions that deepen targeting and promote rural equity.To help ensure the incentive reaches the communities that need it most, the bill tightens eligibility by lowering the income threshold for designation: now only neighborhoods with incomes at or below 70% of the area median will qualify (down from 80%). It also creates a new category of Rural Opportunity Zones and establishes Rural Qualified Opportunity Funds with enhanced benefits. For example:Investors in OZs still get a 10% step-up in tax basis if they hold their investments for five years.In rural OZs, the step-up is even greater—30% for those same five-year investments.Rural OZ projects also benefit from a lower “substantial improvement” requirement—50% rather than the previous 100%.Another important advancement: the bill includes data collection, reporting, and transparency requirements for Opportunity Zones, along with $15 million for the IRS to implement them. This is a step toward more accountability and better targeting of investments.However, we’re disappointed that many key proposals to better align OZs with affordable housing, NMTC, and community development financial institutions (CDFIs) were not included. Enterprise has long raised concerns that OZs have not effectively delivered for affordable housing, and most of our recommendations to fix that were left out. There are industry efforts to explore other regulatory and administrative actions that could improve the use of OZs in producing and preserving affordable housing.Still, the transparency provisions and permanency are meaningful steps forward, and we will continue advocating for improvements in all communities.Energy Efficiency and RenewablesIn recent years, many LIHTC developers integrated IRA energy credits into their capital stacks. This allowed developers to invest in more comprehensive energy efficiency and renewable energy measures, leading to long term energy savings for both building owners and residents. Under the OBBBA, most of these credits will be phased out within a year.Developers have already begun to revise scopes and seek gap funding for projects in their pipelines that relied on the New Energy Efficient Home (45L) or the Energy Efficient Commercial Buildings Deduction (179D) credits. In the case of 45L, buildings will have to be built, sold/leased, and Energy Star certified by July 2026. For 179D, projects would have to begin construction by July 2026. While the Investment Tax Credit (48E) for solar and wind also faces a much earlier phaseout, the runway is a bit longer. To qualify for the credit, projects must begin construction by July 4, 2026 and placed-in-service by the end of 2027.  Beginning in 2026, there are also additional requirements related to “Foreign Entity of Concern” (FEOC) restrictions. Currently, the definition of “commence construction” requires at least 5% of project costs to be expended, but a recent Executive Order(link is external)  suggests that may be revised.The repeal of the underlying statute and rescission of unobligated funds for the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) is another provision that concerns affordable housing developers. Many developers are primed to apply for and integrate this critical funding into projects to ensure energy affordability and healthy living for their residents. Enterprise is part of the Power Forward Communities(link is external) coalition which received a GGRF award. While 99%+ of GGRF funds are officially obligated, the program is currently tied up in litigation. We expect that the future of the program and access to funds will be determined by the courts.  Amendments FiledOver 500 amendments to the bill were filed in the Senate. The vast majority of them were filed by Democrats, and either failed or were not even voted on. Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), who is a close ally and frequent partner, offered an amendment to include the 30% rural basis boost, but it did not receive a vote. We worked with Senate Republicans, including Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), to broaden support for key clean energy tax credits(link is external), emphasizing the impact of 45L and the ICT on LIHTC deals. The same is true for the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. While there was support, these efforts did not prevail.Overall, this bill is a big step forward for low-income communities, but our work is not done. The bill is not related to FY26 appropriations, which funds and authorizes appropriated programs such as HOME, CDBG, and Section 4. According to the National Council of State Housing Agencies, an average of 16.9% of Housing Credit units receive HOME funding, and an average of 51% of HOME units receive Housing Credit funding.Without robust funding of the HOME program, the Housing Credit provisions in the reconciliation bill will be inefficient at increasing the housing supply. Our advocacy team remains hard at work in the FY26 appropriations process. We look forward to seeing what legislative and regulatory opportunities can make the expansions of the Housing Credit and NMTC, as well as the expansion of OZs, strengthen affordable housing production and preservation.Related Topics:Low-Income Housing Tax CreditNew Markets Tax CreditPolicy

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House Advances FY26 Housing and Community Development Spending Proposals

House Advances FY26 Housing and Community Development Spending Proposals

By Sarah Williams  -  2026-01-16 11:18:28

The House Appropriations Committee approved the HUD fiscal year 2026 (FY26) spending bill(link is external) on July 17, rejecting many of the drastic cuts and proposals to consolidate rental assistance and homelessness programs that were included in the President’s budget request, but still including cuts to key housing and community development programs.  The House Appropriations Subcommittee for Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (THUD) proposed $67.75 billion for HUD in net discretionary funding, $939 million below what agency currently is funded at for FY25 under the full year Continuing Resolution.  Many of Enterprise’s priorities did receive level funding, such as the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG), the Section 4 Capacity Building for Affordable Housing and Community Development programs, and Native American Programs. According to House Republicans(link is external), the amount provided for rental assistance programs would be sufficient for renewing all existing contracts. However, House Democrats(link is external) believe that the amounts provided could lead to the eviction of thousands of low-income families. This proposal would also eliminate programs like the HOME Investment Partnership Program (HOME). The Committee report (link is external)cites funding that remains available through the HOME-American Rescue Plan (HOME-ARP) program as the reason to not provide funding for the core HOME program. HOME-ARP is not a substitute for the core HOME program as they serve different purposes and populations. The core HOME program is expressly designed to help state and local governments create affordable housing for low-income households and serves as an essential gap filler for many transactions involving the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (Housing Credit).  A breakdown of the affordable housing and community development spending levels can be found in our Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Request and Appropriations Chart. Here’s where funding for some of HUD’s key programs stands compared to last year’s budget:  $35.3 billion for Tenant-Based Rental Assistance (Housing Choice Vouchers), a $877 million (2%) decrease from FY25.  $17.1 million for Project-Based Rental Assistance, a $637 million increase (4%) from FY25.  $7.3 billion for Public Housing Fund, a $1.5 billion (17%) decrease from FY25. This total includes $4.98 billion for the operating fund, $500 million (9%) below FY25, and $2.29 billion for the capital fund, $913 million (28%) below FY25.  $950 million for Section 202 Housing for the Elderly, an $18 million (2%) increase from FY25.  $261.8 million for Section 811 Housing for Persons with Disabilities, $5 million (2%) above FY25 enacted.  $5.6 billion for the Community Development Fund (CDF). Of this, $3.3 billion is allocated for the CDBG, equal to FY25. An additional $2.3 billion in CDF is for earmarks and congressionally directed spending projects. The House proposal does not include funding for the Pathways to Removing Obstacles (PRO) Housing grant program.  $4.16 billion for Homeless Assistance Grants, $107 million (3%) above FY25 enacted. This includes $290 million for Emergency Solutions Grants (ESG) and $3.9 billion for Continuum of Care (CoC), rejecting the administration’s proposal to consolidate the Housing Opportunities for Persons with Aids, ESG, and CoC programs.  $1.34 billion for Native American Programs, level with FY25. This includes $1.11 billion for the Native American Housing Block Grant formula program and $150 million for the competitive program, both level with FY25.$125 million for the Family Self-Sufficiency (FSS) program, $15.5 million (11%) below FY25.  $29.5 million for the Fair Housing Activities, a $56.8 million (66%) decrease from FY25. The proposal maintains the funding for the Fair Housing Assistance Program ($26 million), National Fair Housing Training Academy ($1.5 million), and the Limited English proficiency initiative ($1 million) but would eliminate funding for the Fair Housing Initiatives Program (funded at $56 million in FY25).  $42 million for the Section 4 program, level with FY25.  Elimination of ProgramsThe House THUD proposes to eliminate the following programs key housing and community development programs:  HOME Investment Partnership Program, which was funded at $1.25 billion in FY25.Choice Neighborhoods Initiative, which was funded at $75 million in FY25.Preservation and Reinvestment Initiative for Community Enhancement (PRICE) program, funded at $10 million in FY25.  U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)On June 23, the House Appropriations Committee approved(link is external) the proposed spending levels for rural housing programs(link is external) under the USDA Rural Housing Service. Below is an overview of the spending proposal:$1.715 billion for Section 521 Rental Assistance, $73 million (4%) above FY25.$880 million for the Section 502 Single Family Housing Direct Loan Program, $164 million (30%) above FY25. It also provides $6 million for the Tribal Direct Relending Pilot, $1.4 million above FY25.  $400 million for the USDA Section 538 guaranteed loans to preserve and rehabilitate USDA rental housing, level with FY25.$60 million for the Section 515 Rural Rental Housing program, $13 million (28%) above FY25.$30 million for the Multi-family Housing Preservation and Revitalization Program, $16 million (35%) below FY25.  TreasuryThe Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) subcommittee(link is external), which provides funding for the Treasury, released its proposal on July 20 and provided $23.3 billion for the agencies under its jurisdiction. This includes:$276 million for the CDFI Fund, $47 million (15%) below FY25 levels. The bill does not include the administration’s proposal to eliminate all CDFI Fund financial assistance programs, nor does it include the proposed $100 million program targeted to rural areas.  Enterprise opposes cuts to housing and community development programs and will continue to advocate for Congress to provide robust funding levels for affordable housing and community development.  To stay up to date with critical policy news,subscribeto our bi-monthly Capitol Express newsletter.  Related Topics:Policy

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Denver Regional TOD Fund Expands Affordable Homes in Littleton

Denver Regional TOD Fund Expands Affordable Homes in Littleton

By Robert Johnson  -  2026-01-26 05:11:05

Rendering by KEPHART architectural design and planning firm. Courtesy of South Metro Housing Options.The housing authority for the City of Littleton, Colorado, is embarking on its third development in as many years, thanks in part to the Denver Regional Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) Fund. A 73-unit, mixed-income community along the bustling West Littleton Boulevard corridor, Starlight Apartments will welcome residents in 2027, pending a Low-Income Housing Tax Credit award.The loan to South Metro Housing Options(link is external) (SMHO) is the latest investment from the TOD Fund, which launched in Denver more than 15 years ago and now serves the entire seven-county metro region. To date, the Fund has provided $72 million in below-market acquisition financing, helping quickly secure high-opportunity sites along transit corridors for affordable and mixed-income housing.Managed by Enterprise’s Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI), the Enterprise Community Loan Fund, the TOD Fund is a partnership among state and local housing agencies, philanthropic institutions, CDFIs, and major banks. This marks the Fund’s third renewal for an additional five-year term – a testament to its success among funding partners and borrowers.“The TOD Fund allows developers to acquire strategic sites near transit stops and allows for a longer hold period than a typical acquisition loan, all while offering a low, competitive rate,” Joseph Mattingly, senior loan officer, said. “The TOD Fund has helped developers acquire 29 sites since 2008, which has resulted in the preservation or creation of over 2,900 affordable homes for metro-Denver residents.”2,900affordable homes created or preserved29loans made$72Mtotal TOD Fund loans deployed$761Min leveraged financing from public and private partnersLand Acquisition in a Tight MarketFor SMHO, the TOD Fund provided a $1.2 million loan to purchase a vacant lot, which will become affordable apartment homes serving households earning 30- to 70-percent of the area median income. The flexibility of this financing also allowed the housing authority to negotiate with a neighboring family trust, ultimately assembling a larger site that expanded the project from 40–50 units to 73.Land availability is one of the steepest barriers to affordable housing in Denver’s inner-ring suburbs. Littleton, a community of about 50,000 residents, offers few parcels suitable for development, which creates intense competition from market-rate buyers. This particular property was in high demand, since it is in a walkable, transit-rich corridor that the city is actively planning to revitalize.“The TOD Fund allowed us to preserve our cash, compete for additional land, and move forward with a stronger, more ambitious project than we could have done otherwise,” said Sarah Buhr, SMHO’s real estate development manager.The development has already secured commitments of $1.46 million from the State of Colorado, and $17 million in private activity bond cap, in addition to private equity. Local support has been strong, with Arapahoe County already committing over $580,000 to the project, and the City of Littleton has provided a letter of intent to provide up to $800,000 in funding.Like many small housing authorities, SMHO historically focused on administering vouchers and public housing. But with limited federal reinvestment in public housing and rising local housing costs, the agency made the strategic decision to pursue development directly.“Administering vouchers alone doesn’t cover costs,” Buhr explained. “Development is the way we can reinvest in the community and provide new housing opportunities.”Deep Affordability in a 4% DealThe Starlight Apartments demonstrates how income-averaging tax credits can stretch impact for residents. Properties can now meet affordability requirements if at least 40% of units average 60% of AMI or less, with unit designations set in 10% increments between 20% and 80%—expanding tax credit flexibility beyond the original 20 at 50 and 40 at 60 AMI tests.Of the 73 homes:11 will serve households at 30% AMI, far deeper than most 4% credit deals can supportThe balance of the units (62) will serve workforce households earning up to 70% AMI, with a mix of studios, one- and two-bedroom apartmentsSMHO will dedicate eight project-based vouchers to youth aging out of foster care, with supportive services provided through local partners.“We’re proud of this model,” Buhr said. “Higher-income units help offset those deeply affordable rents, and in the end, everyone is just another resident of the community.”ImageRendering by KEPHART architectural design and planning firm. Courtesy of South Metro Housing Options.A Modern Design Rooted in PlaceThe Starlight Apartments design incorporates mid-century modern elements, reflecting the style of the ‘Mid-Mod Mile’ along West Littleton Boulevard. SMHO designed the four-story, 73-unit community not only to fit the neighborhood’s character, but also to serve the people who keep it vibrant.“The West Littleton Boulevard corridor is home to local businesses, retail, grocery stores, and transit options, which offers teachers, retail workers, and others the opportunity to live close to jobs and amenities,” Chase Seebohar, SMHO housing developer, said.Since its inception, the Denver Regional TOD has helped create homes that keep people connected to their communities—developments like the Starlight Apartments show what’s possible.“We have some great partners in the TOD Fund that have continued their investments for over 15 years,” Mattingly said. “With the renewal, we can continue to help developer partners acquire sites near transit to create and preserve more affordable units in the Denver-metro area for many years to come.”TOD Fund partners include the Colorado Housing Finance Authority, the State Division of Housing, the City and County of Denver’s Department of Housing Stability (HOST), Mercy Community Capital, Impact Development Fund, Denver Foundation, Gates Family Foundation, Rose Community Foundation, First Bank, U.S. Bank, and Wells Fargo.Related Topics:Community Development Financial InstitutionLow-Income Housing Tax CreditPolicy Rocky Mountain

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Senate Advances FY26 Housing and Community Development Spending Proposals

Senate Advances FY26 Housing and Community Development Spending Proposals

By Sarah Johnson  -  2026-01-03 16:06:51

The Senate Appropriations Committee approved(link is external) its HUD fiscal year 2026 (FY26) spending bill proposal(link is external) on July 24, rejecting many of the drastic cuts and proposals to consolidate rental assistance and homelessness programs that were included in the President’s Budget Request, and avoiding many of the cuts that were proposed in the House bill. The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee for Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (THUD) proposed $73.3 billion for HUD in net discretionary funding, $3.1 billion above what the agency currently is funded at for FY25 under the full year Continuing Resolution.In addition to rejecting the administration’s proposals to consolidate rental assistance programs into a state-based rental assistance program and merging the Homeless Assistance Grants and the Housing Opportunities for Persons with Aids programs to the Emergency Solutions Grant programs — the Senate proposal provides overall higher levels for the rental assistance programs compared to the House proposal. The bill does also not include any language that would provide additional flexibility for Public Housing Agencies to enact time limits or work requirements for rental assistance programs. Overall, the legislation provides higher amounts for housing and community development programs including providing level funding for the HOME Investment partnership program, which was proposed to be eliminated in the President’s Budget Request and House proposal. The bill would provide a slight reduction to the Community Development Block Grant program but does include funding for the PRO Housing Grant program. A breakdown of the affordable housing and community development spending levels can be found in our Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Request and Appropriations Chart. Here’s where funding for some of HUD’s key programs stands compared to last year’s budget:$37.4 billion for Tenant-Based Rental Assistance (Housing Choice Vouchers), a $1.3 billion (3%) increase from FY25 and $2.1 billion (6%) above the House.$17.8 billion for Project-Based Rental Assistance, a $1.3 billion increase (8%) from FY25 and $677 million (4%) above the House.$8.4 billion for Public Housing Fund, a $400 million (5%) decrease from FY25. This total includes $4.87 billion for the operating fund, $602 million (11%) below FY25, and $3.2 billion for the capital fund, level with FY25.  $972 million for Section 202 Housing for the Elderly, a $40 million (4%) increase from FY25 and $12 million (2%) above the House.$265 million for Section 811 Housing for Persons with Disabilities, $8 million (3%) above FY25 and $3 million (1%) above the House.$4.5 billion for the Community Development Fund (CDF). Of this, $3.1 billion is allocated for the CDBG, which is $200 million (6%) less than what was provided in FY25 and the House proposal. An additional $1.3 billion in CDF is for earmarks and congressionally directed spending projects. The Senate also includes $60 million for the PRO Housing Grants program, $40 million (40%) less than what was provided in FY25. The House no funding for the PRO Housing Grants programs$1.25 billion for the HOME Investment Partnership Program, level with FY25. The House proposed to eliminate funding for the HOME program.$4.51 billion for Homeless Assistance Grants, $450 million (11%) above FY25 enacted. This includes $290 million for Emergency Solutions Grants (ESG) and $4 billion for Continuum of Care (CoC), rejecting the administration’s proposal to consolidate the Housing Opportunities for Persons with Aids, ESG, and CoC programs.$1.35 billion for Native American Programs, level with FY25. This includes $1.11 billion for the Native American Housing Block Grant formula program and $100 million for the competitive program, both level with FY25.$156 million for the Family Self-Sufficiency (FSS) program, $15.5 million (11%) above FY25 and $31 million (25%) above the House.$86.4 million for the Fair Housing Activities, level with FY25 and $56 million (193%) above the House. The proposal maintains the funding for the Fair Housing Assistance Program ($26 million), National Fair Housing Training Academy ($1.5 million), and the Limited English proficiency initiative ($1 million). The bill also maintains funding for the Fair Housing Initiatives Program (FHIP) at $56 million, which was proposed to be eliminated in the President’s Budget Request and House proposal.$49 million for the Section 4 program, a $7 million (17%) increase from FY25 and the House.$40 million for the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative, a $35 million (47%) decrease from FY25. The House proposed to eliminate funding for this program.$10 million for the Preservation and Reinvestment Initiative for Community Enhancement (PRICE) program, level with FY25. The House proposed to eliminate funding for this program.U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)On July 10, the Senate Appropriations Committee unanimously approved(link is external) the proposed spending levels for rural housing programs(link is external) under the USDA Rural Housing Service. Below is an overview of the spending proposal:$1.715 billion for Section 521 Rental Assistance, $73 million (4%) above FY25 and equal to the House. This bill continues to provide authority for its mortgage decoupling pilot, increasing the number of eligible units from 1,000 units to 5,000 units.$1 billion for the Section 502 Single Family Housing Direct Loan Program, $284 million (40%) above FY25 and $120 million (14%) above the House. It also provides $5 million for the Tribal Direct Relending Pilot, $367,000 above FY25 and $1 million below the House.$400 million for the USDA Section 538 guaranteed loans to preserve and rehabilitate USDA rental housing, level with FY25 and the House.$50 million for the Section 515 Rural Rental Housing program, $3 million (6%) above FY25 and $10 million (17%) below the House.$34 million for the Multi-family Housing Preservation and Revitalization Program, $12 million (26%) below FY25 and $4 million (13%) above the House.Congress is not expected to pass any of the 12 appropriations bills before the September 30 deadline. It is expected that there will be one or more continuing resolutions to extend funding to avoid a government shutdown. In the recent fiscal years, the first continuing resolution typically went well past Thanksgiving and lasted into the December holidays. Enterprise will continue to advocate to both chambers for the highest possible funding levels for affordable housing and community development programs.To stay up to date with critical housing policy news,subscribeto our bi-monthly Capitol Express newsletter. Related Topics:Policy

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The Heart of Detroit: Powering Change Block by Block

The Heart of Detroit: Powering Change Block by Block

By Jane Smith  -  2026-01-26 09:50:06

Enterprise and Detroit CDOs at the nation’s capital.Community development doesn’t happen from the top down — it’s built from the block up, by the people and organizations who know their neighborhoods best. That’s the vision behind Enterprise’s Community Partners’ Community Development Organization (CDO) Fund. Since 2020, Enterprise has invested nearly $40 million in 36 CDOs across Detroit, supporting the people and organizations working every day to make their neighborhoods more equitable, vibrant, and livable.These organizations are doing it all — from housing development to climate resilience, youth programming to economic revitalization. Together, they’ve created over $200 million in economic impact while employing more than 430 staff and local contractors. And beyond the numbers, they are transforming lives, restoring blocks, and building a future for Detroit residents — one home, one business, and one street at a time.Detroit’s strength has always come from its neighborhoods and the people who know them best. Through the CDO Fund, we’re making sure community organizations have the resources and staying power they need to turn vision into reality—whether that’s housing, economic development, or building the next generation of local leaders.Melinda Clemons, Vice President and Detroit Market Leader, Enterprise Community PartnersFrom Grit to GroundbreakingImageJeanine Hatcher and the GenesisHOPE team breaking ground on Preston Townhomes.Jeanine Hatcher, executive director of GenesisHOPE,(link is external) remembers when her organization was running on pure grit—no full-time staff, just volunteers and consultants. With support from the CDO Fund, GenesisHOPE has grown into a thriving organization with eight staff and a bold housing agenda. They recently broke ground on Preston Townhomes in Detroit's Islandview neighborhood, and they’re working to develop the Common Ground Community Land Trust to bring permanent affordability under community control.“It feels great to have achieved what we set out to do,” shared Hatcher. “We would not have 31 units made for families without the CDO Fund’s support, and we hope this is the first of many.” Building Back, Block by BlockImageQuincy Jones provides a tour of Osborn Neighborhood Alliance’sMapleridgeproject.On the northeast side of Detroit, Osborn Neighborhood Alliance is wrapping up their Mapleridge project(link is external). The organization took a block where homes were completely abandoned and transformed it into a place where families are moving in, becoming first-time homeowners of affordable duplexes, and renting out their second units to households with vouchers. The CDO Fund helped Osborn become an independent 501(c)(3) and take on development and rehab for the first time. “When you go back five years, you never would have thought that the street would come back, but with the right resources, proper planning, and an organization that knows how to do development, you can bring back a neighborhood,” said Quincy Jones, Executive Director of Osborn Neighborhood Alliance. “Now, there are no abandoned homes on that block, and we know for a fact that it’s our direct impact.”Money You Can Count OnImageLisa Johanon of Central Detroit Christian and George Adams of 360 Detroit (fifth and sixth from the right) celebrate their West Euclid Gateway Housing project.Across the board, CDO leaders emphasize the unique value of flexible, multi-year, operational support—a rarity in the nonprofit world. “Operating support is often the most difficult money to raise, so knowing you had a set amount of funding that was coming to you, that wasn’t restricted in terms of how it could be spent, has been phenomenal,” shared Lisa Johanon, Founder and Executive Director of Central Detroit Christian(link is external).Central Detroit Christian used some of their operating support to pay the mortgage on their building, which serves as their office, as well as a community space. “We’re almost debt free right now—that is incredibly exciting because that money will be freed up to either invest in programs or people,” said Johanon. “We’re getting ready to launch a private school and hope to develop permanent supportive housing for 40 families next year.”As part of the West Euclid Gateway Housing project,(link is external) CDC is also wrapping up the rehab of 20 homes with 360 Detroit(link is external), a member of the Elevating CDO cohort of the Fund. This smaller cohort is focused on building up the capacity of emerging non-profitsthat  benefit from the intensive support. “Multi-year funding for operating support was huge. We were able to hire support staff and programming staff, and plan a few years out,” shared George Adams, executive director of 360 Detroit, “Because of that operational support, we’re able to totally focus, the community benefits, the organization benefits, it’s beneficial to the whole ecosystem.”Collaboration over CompetitionImageGovernor Gretchen Whitmer (fifth from left) and Caitlin Murphy (third from right) celebrate Live6 Alliance’sMichigan Main Street designation.(link is external)Another common theme echoed by all CDO Fund participants was the unique strength of the cohort model. “We're all representing different organizations, different parts of the city,” said Caitlin Murphy, executive director of Live6 Alliance(link is external). “Given the nature of fundraising and running small nonprofits, sometimes it feels like we're in competition with one another. The CDO Fund really built an understanding that there's a larger strategy that we could tap into as a collective to advocate for resources, policy, reform.”Live6 is part of Enterprise’s Key Corridors cohort of CDOs focused on revitalizing commercial corridors in Detroit by encouraging responsible development and supporting business growth. As Pamela Martin, president and CEO of Vanguard Community Development, another Key Corridors member, put it, "A cohesive group is stronger than disparate, individual groups in a city as large as Detroit. We’ve built relationships with one another, even talking about doing collaborative work, which would not have happened without Enterprise.” That collaboration also goes beyond Detroit. The CDO Fund hosts learning exchanges in other cities where community organizations are doing exciting work. “If it can happen in Atlanta, D.C., Baltimore, theoretically, it can happen in some fashion here in Detroit,” said Martin. “It’s important to be inspired and dream big.”   What’s next?Detroit’s CDOs are ready to take on more. More homes. More commercial corridors. More inclusive development that centers residents. But they need sustained investment—and the CDO Fund is proof that it works. The CDO Fund is powered by seven incredible philanthropic partners who have seen the success of our partners on the ground firsthand: Kresge Foundation, Ford Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Ballmer Group, Gilbert Family Foundation, Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Foundation, and Hudson-Webber Foundation. Their support has directly helped Detroit’s CDO ecosystem expand in capacity and cross-collaboration. With planning for the third round of funding underway, Enterprise looks forward to seeing local leaders make an even greater impact on the city and invites philanthropic partners to join the fund and be a part of that change. Related Topics:Detroit

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