Senate Passes Most Robust Affordable Housing Bill In Decades
Affordable housing has long been one of the biggest roadblocks to wealth generation for the average American. Homebuilding has never truly recovered since the 2008 financial crisis, with housing demand far outpacing supply. In an effort to address the issue, the Senate passed a bipartisan bill to dramatically increase the supply of affordable housing nationwide.
According to NBC News, the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, drafted by Sens. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), passed in a 89 to 10 vote. “It’s Democrats. It’s Republicans. It’s pieces they built out together,” Warren told NPR. “That is the strength of this bill.”
“It’s not a Republican issue or a Democrat Issue,” Scott said ahead of the vote. “It’s an issue about helping moms like the one who raised me, the amazing woman that she was, become homeowners.”
It’s rare to see this level of bipartisanship in modern-day U.S. politics, but affordability is one of the top issues facing everyday Americans. With a growing number of voters feeling like the Trump administration, and by extension, the GOP, aren’t doing anything to address the issue, this bill gives both Democrats and Republicans a needed victory ahead of the midterms.
The 303-page bill takes a two-pronged approach toward creating more affordable housing. It creates grants and pilot programs to encourage the building of more affordable housing, while also “cutting regulatory red tape, lowering costs and expanding housing supply while generating no new spending,” according to Scott.
“If we want to bring down the cost of housing, we’ve got to build a lot more,” said Warren. “And what I love about this bill is that it has more than 40 different provisions in it, all of which aim in the same direction, which is to give a push toward building more housing.”
The bill also targets the growing trend of private equity firms and hedge funds buying homes in a section called “Homes Are For People, Not Corporations,” which “prohibits large institutional investors from purchasing certain single-family homes, in an effort “to promote homeownership opportunities for American families, not corporations.” One of the key provisions in this section requires corporations to sell any single-family homes they may own after seven years.
This section received the most pushback from several congressmembers, including Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), the lone Democrat who voted against the bill.
“There’s literally no reason for this,” Schatz said on the floor. “Anyone who wants to build housing and then provide it for rent is going to be forced to sell after seven years. … A lot of these folks are not actually in a position to sell after seven years. They will not have made their money back.”
It appears Schatz is missing the point of this provision, which seems to be discouraging the slow creep of private equity into the housing market.
The House passed a similar, more limited version of the bill last month. Many of the provisions of the House bill were included in the Senate’s version, so hopefully, it won’t take long for the House to reconcile the two bills. Should the bill pass in the House, it’s unclear if President Donald Trump would sign it, as he recently said he would refuse to sign any legislation until the SAVE America Act passes. House Speaker Mike Johnson recently told his colleagues that Trump privately relayed his laser focus on the SAVE America Act and said, “no one gives a (bleep) about housing.”
White House Spokesperson Davis Ingle told NBC News that Johnson’s account was “not accurate whatsoever” and that Trump “has been laser-focused on making housing more affordable.” You know, I have serious doubts about that.
At a time when prices are going up for basically every essential good as a result of his misguided war in Iran, it would behoove Trump to give a damn about affordable housing.
SEE ALSO:
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Senate Passes Most Robust Affordable Housing Bill In Decades was originally published on newsone.com
