Table of Contents
.jpg)
Do not index
Do not index
Read the research at the Urban Institute
excerpt:
“We find that reforms that loosen restrictions are associated with a statistically significant 0.8 percent increase in housing supply within three to nine years of reform passage, accounting for new and existing stock. This increase occurs predominantly for units at the higher end of the rent price distribution; we find no statistically significant evidence that additional lower-cost units became available or became less expensive in the years following reforms. However, impacts are positive across the affordability spectrum and we cannot rule out that impacts are equivalent across different income segments. Conversely, reforms that increase land-use restrictions and lower allowed densities are associated with increased median rents and a reduction in units affordable to middle-income renters.
These results suggest that reforms loosening restrictions are, on average, associated with an uptick in new housing supply. But this increase is likely inadequate in the short term to expand the availability of housing that is affordable to low- and middle-income households, at least within the jurisdictions that execute reforms and among the reforms that we studied. Reforms tightening regulations potentially worsen conditions for low- and moderate-income renters. Cities should consider pairing direct investments in housing subsidies—such as immediate investments in housing vouchers and project-based subsidies for publicly assisted housing—with reforms loosening restrictions to address both short-term and long-term housing affordability.”
