Housing Development Policy Toolkit Released

The White House recently released a Housing Development Toolkitto highlight policies that cities have used to address shortages in affordable housing, particularly those caused by an undersupplied housing market. In recent decades, housing costs have increased much faster than household income, resulting in a growing housing affordability crisis in many U.S. cities. A major cause of this escalation in housing costs is inadequate housing production, particularly in high-growth metropolitan areas like San Francisco, New York, and Chicago. The lack of affordable housing impedes the economic mobility of many American families and has a significant negative effect on GDP. The report describes a number of policy levers cities have used to increase housing production, several of which have been used in innovative ways by HUD’s Sustainable Communities grantees.