The National Housing Law Project published a visionary plan for the next president and administration to fix the housing crisis by preserving safe and affordable housing and protecting tenants and homeowners. The plan is laid out in a set of documents covering preservation of affordable housing, tenants’ rights, and homeownership. The documents also include a set of tables with regulatory actions that should be taken by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Agriculture, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and the Department of the Treasury.
The next president and administration have an opportunity to partner with us and our thousands-strong national network of housing justice advocates to solve the housing crisis. We need presidential leadership focused on housing policy that centers tenants not the real estate industry, and keeps working poor families and communities of color stably housed.
Preserve and Expand Federally-Assisted Housing
More than 5.4 million families live in federally-assisted rental housing, and the majority of these tenants are Black, Indigenous, people of color (BIPOC); older adults; and people with disabilities. Tenants who live in federally-assisted housing pay rent proportionate to their income, helping them to better afford other necessities including food, medicine, and childcare. Despite the housing affordability crisis, many of the country’s federally-assisted housing programs stopped producing new units of affordable housing decades ago. Of the remaining stock, the affordability restrictions for more than 745,000 federally-assisted homes will expire by 2031, with no plan to replace them. The most effective way to maintain the supply of affordable housing is to preserve federally-assisted housing stock and protect the people who live in it. Recommendations include:
- Preserve, modernize, and expand public housing;
- Preserve, improve, and expand HUD’s project-based section 8 program; and
- Preserve and improve the treasury’s Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program.
Expand and Improve the Housing Choice Voucher Program
The Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program makes housing affordable for more than 2.3 million households nationwide. People of color, older adults and people with disabilities make up the majority of people in the voucher program. HUD vouchers allow rent-burdened Americans to lease in the private rental market and frees up families’ budgets for other basic needs like medication, child care, and groceries. Recommendations include:
- Adequately fund HUD’s Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) programs and the services that make vouchers successful;
- Increase opportunities for families with vouchers to lease up in the private market;
- Deconcentrate voucher families and support moves to high opportunity neighborhoods; and
- Strengthen tenants’ rights in the HCV program.
Preserve, Improve, and Expand the USDA Rural Rental Housing Portfolio
The Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development rental housing is often the only safe and affordable housing in rural communities. Most of the approximately 400,000 remaining RD units will be lost within the next 25 years unless there is government action to prevent the loss. More than half of extremely low-income rural renter households experience housing insecurity. Recommendations include:
- Congress should adequately fund USDA Rural Development (RD) Housing Programs;
- Preserve existing Section 515 developments;
- Improve programs that support residents facing mortgage expiration, prepayment, or foreclosure; and
- Ensure RD’s housing programs and policies welcome immigrant and mixed-status families.
Protect Tenants from Landlord Abuse in the Rental Housing Market
There are more than 114 million tenants in the United States rental housing market, and many are denied basic rights. The power imbalance between tenants and landlords, compounded by the outsized influence of the real estate industry on policymakers, has exacerbated the housing crisis in the United States. Faced with threats of eviction and homelessness, tenants often endure egregious rent increases, landlord harassment, and poor living conditions just to keep a roof over their heads. Recommendations include:
- Require owners and landlords to adopt tenant protections whenever they receive financial backing from the federal government;
- Rein in unfair and deceptive corporate practices in the rental housing industry;
- Enforce fair housing and other civil rights for tenants;
- Safeguard tenants against evictions;
- Strengthen tenant protections in federally subsidized housing programs; and
- Devote resources to federally-assisted tenants who organize and protect them from retaliation.
Increase Homeownership and Protect Homeowners from Home Loss and Equity Stripping
Homeownership is a primary pathway to housing stability and wealth creation. For many low-income families and Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC), the path is blocked by discrimination, predatory practices, and inadequate regulation. An increasingly commodified housing market, high interest rates and the soaring costs of homeowners insurance and maintenance limit homeownership opportunities for historically marginalized communities and first-time homebuyers. Recommendations include:
- The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau should finalize important regulations to keep low-income families in their homes and improve transparency of mortgage servicing data;
- The Department of Agriculture must strengthen support for sustainable homeownership in rural areas; and
- The Department of Energy should increase oversight of IRA implementation in financially vulnerable and historically excluded communities.
