NLIHC hosted a national HoUSed campaign call on February 12. We were joined by Whitney Airgood-Obrycki of Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies (JCHS), who shared a new report on rental housing in the U.S. in 2024. According to the report, half of renters in the U.S. are housing cost-burdened, spending between 30-50% of their income on the cost of housing alone. Renters with the lowest incomes – those earning 30% or less of area median income (AMI), or living below the poverty line – are hardest hit by rising rents, with 86% of extremely low-income renters experiencing housing cost burden. The report also found that, despite a growth in the construction of rental housing and “softening” of the rental market, an estimated 2.2 million units of deeply affordable rental units, priced at $600 per month or less, were lost to obsolescence or decay.
We also received a field update from Laura Harding of ERASE Racism. Laura shared a new Affordable and Inclusive Housing Tool, developed through a partnership between ERASE Racism and North Arrow consulting, to help easily identify racially segregated areas, as well as “high-opportunity areas” that should be considered prime locations for affordable housing development, and “low-opportunity areas” that should receive greater community investments to improve local resources.
NLIHC’s Kim Johnson discussed the status of the federal appropriations process and how advocates can begin planning for Capitol Hill Day on March 21. NLIHC will host a Hill Day Prep webinar on February 29 to help advocates prepare for Hill Day meetings.
The next NLIHC national HoUSed campaign call will be held on March 11 from 2:30 to 3:30 pm ET. Register for the call at: https://tinyurl.com/ru73qan
Resources discussed on the 2/12 call:
- New Report on Rental Housing in 2024 – Whitney Airgood-Obrycki, JCHS, Harvard University
- Field Update – Laura Harding, ERASE Racism (NY)
- ERASE Racism’s Affordable and Inclusive Housing Tool
- Online tutorial video
- North Arrow consulting firm, which assisted ERASE Racism in developing their Affordable and Inclusive Housing Tool
- Policy Updates – Kim Johnson, NLIHC
- Email or call your members’ offices to tell them about the importance of affordable housing, homelessness, and community development resources to you, your family, your community, or your work. You can use NLIHC’s Take Action page to look up your member offices or call/send an email directly!
- Register to join NLIHC’s Hill Day Prep webinar on February 29. While the webinar is geared towards advocates who will be attending NLIHC’s Hill Day on March 21, all are welcome to join the webinar.
- National, state, local, tribal, and territorial organizations can also join over 2,200 organizations on CHCDF’s national letter calling on Congress to support the highest level of funding possible for affordable housing, homelessness, and community development resources in FY24.
- Take action to urge your senators to include key reforms to LIHTC in the bipartisan tax bill so the credit better serves extremely low-income households, including those experiencing homelessness.
Register for the next webinar here!