Housing Trust Fund Research Articles

Housing Preference and Choice of Nigerians: Evidence from the Organised Private Sector Housing

The decline of housing as a political priority despite growing demand has made housing choice decision more difficult. This study is an examination of the revealed preference of beneficiaries of organized private sector housing delivery in Nigeria. The study relied on data collected from sampled estates from two (2) states in each of the six geo – political zones of Nigeria. These are flats, bungalows, semi – detached and detached houses. In all, about 58% of all beneficiaries choose flats about 31% choose bungalows 7% choose semi – detached houses and only about 4% of all the beneficiaries choose detached houses. The findings from this study showed that about 89% of all beneficiaries choose flats and bungalows. The policy implication of the preponderance of flat and bungalow in the housing choice of beneficiaries is that they are the popular, acceptable and affordable typologies of Nigerians. Therefore, these types of houses should be given priority in funding by National Housing Trust Fund (NHTF).

City‐level housing trust funds: Lessons from key case studies

AbstractThe United States needs more housing. The need for the creation of new housing and rehabilitation of existing housing stock at price points that middle‐ and working‐class families can afford has created a pent‐up demand revealed in housing assessment reports across the country. Housing trust funds have been increasingly used as one tool among other efforts to meet this proven need for more affordable housing (affordable housing is understood to mean paying less than 30% of household income on housing costs, otherwise stated as the 30% of income affordability threshold). This paper explores this important tool, overviewing crucial information needed by scholars of affordable housing as well as policymakers, housing advocates, and other stakeholders to understand and act in the use of this vehicle to support affordable housing. Little research exists on understanding the way housing trust funds are constructed and used looking across specific funds. There exists an even greater gap in investigation of the efforts of housing trust funds at local levels. Thus, this paper examines housing trust funds in a comparative manner and does so using city‐level, as opposed to state or federal‐level, funds. There exist key lessons that can be learned from cities around the country that are already engaged in such work. There are three crucial aspects that define successful housing trust funds: funds must be rooted in empirical data on housing needs and feasibility, supported by a dedicated revenue stream drawing ideally from multiple sources is indispensable and management of the fund should be established in context with other efforts at providing and retaining housing at affordable prices. The combination of housing trust fund dollars with other efforts, made stable by dedicated sources of revenue and ongoing research makes them a tool that is a successful addition to work done on supplying the demand for housing at needed price points.

Policy Diffusion in a Redistributive Policy: Affordable Housing and State Housing Trust Funds

Diffusion models explore the reasons policies transfer across governments. In this study, we focus on U.S. state level efforts in affordable housing. Drawing predominately from policy diffusion literature, our research examines the determinants of the creation of state Housing Trust Funds (HTFs). We utilize event history analysis with logit regressions and survival modeling to examine how problem severity, neighbor adoption, economic standing, elected leadership, housing investment, and demographics predict state HTF adoption. Results indicate that both problem severity and elected leadership predict the adoption of HTFs. This work improves our understanding of state policy diffusion and efforts in housing affordability.

English

In recent years, most of the urban centers in Nigeria are fast experiencing housing problems such as unaffordable housing and environmental challenges, all of which determine the nature of housing quality. This research centers on Iba Low Cost Housing Estate, Ojo and the Unity Low Cost Housing Estate Alimosho to carry out a comparative analysis of the residential quality. The research reveals the dilapidated state of the public estate infrastructures due to poor management, thus recommended constant upgrading of infrastructures in the estate and an establishment of local housing trust funds for the development of affordable housing to reduce the pressure on available ones. Key words: Housing, residential quality, low cost housing scheme, public and private estates.

Housing policy-making in Africa: Ten common assumptions

Ten constant assumptions seem to rule policy-making on housing in Sub-Saharan Africa. They are:1.Urban land and housing are expensive and more unaffordable than in the past.2.Rents are too high and skyrocketing.3.The solution to the housing problem is to build housing more cheaply.4.Mortgages for more/poorer households are a large part of the solution.5.Affordable housing is possible through formal sector private investments.6.Establishment of a National Housing Trust Fund will help many households own their own home.7.Housing affordability depends upon household income.8.Land registration is the solution to non-bankable land.9.New supply policy should be based on single household villas on serviced plots.10.Every household should become an owner of housing.From recent experience in seven countries in the region, this paper argues that these are generally untrue and work against the effective provision of appropriate housing affordable by the majority of households in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Evidence Matters Summer 2013

The articles in this issue of Evidence Matters explore a range of strategies designed to promote affordable housing preservation at the national, state, and local levels. The lead article, “Preserving Affordable Rental Housing: A Snapshot of Growing Need, Current Threats, and Innovative Solutions,” reviews the economic and demographic trends prompting increasing demand for affordable housing, the threats to the existing housing stock, and the programs and tactics used by governmental and nonprofit organizations to preserve affordable housing. “Research Spotlight: How Research Tools Are Assisting Communities To Preserve, Plan Affordable Housing” considers the efforts of New York University’s Furman Center and the University of Florida’s Shimberg Center to map affordable housing subsidies and availability to better target areas most in need of preservation. And “In Practice: Models for Affordable Housing Preservation” examines the role that preservation compacts and state housing trust funds play in protecting affordable housing and economic diversity.

The National Housing Trust Fund: Know Your Federal Government-Run-Financial-Corporations

The National Housing Trust is just one of the Federal Government-run corporations. This corporation presents itself as a low-income housing advocate for U.S. citizens. However, the reality is the corporation is a corporate welfare instrument with major political objectives.

The Past and Future of Housing Policy Innovation: The Case of US State Housing Trust Funds

State governments are increasingly expected to help fill the gap between the demand and supply of affordable housing within the US. Little systematic attention has been paid to state housing strategies over the years, despite a lengthening record of policy innovation. This paper asks what factors influence state adoption of housing trust funds (HTFs), and if these factors differ based on how the trust fund is financed and which state agency is responsible for administering it. Utilizing an event history analysis of pooled cross-sectional data, the paper finds that whether or not a state adopts a HTF, who administers it, and how they fund it, varies based on rates of new, single-family development, the size of the black population, prior state housing expenditures, and citizen ideology. The broader implications of these findings are considered for future housing policy innovations beyond states and HTFs.

The Impact of Formula Allocation Discretion in the Housing Trust Fund

The federal Housing Trust Fund (HTF) was created through the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, which also required the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to establish a formula for allocating housing subsidies to states and Insular Areas (American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Marianas Islands, and the Virgin Islands) on the basis of need. HUD’s Office of Policy Development and Research conducted a regulatory impact analysis of the Department’s proposed formula rule, assuming a hypothetical congressional appropriation of $1 billion for the HTF. The analysis summarized the Department’s approach to weighting various statutory factors of housing need and recognized distributional implications for states. The primary impact was determined to be a transfer from the federal government to states in an amount equal to the appropriation. A number of economic factors are not considered in this determination, but it is not clear that the data or capacity exists to examine such factors. This article updates the impact analysis using recent data and incorporates several corrections. Impact A regulatory impact analysis must accompany every economically significant federal rule or regulation. The Office of Policy Development and Research performs this analysis for all economically significant rules of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. An impact analysis is a forecast of the annual benefits and costs accruing to all parties, including the taxpayers, from a given regulation. Modeling these benefits and costs involves use of past research findings, application of economic principles, empirical investigation, and professional judgment.

Reassessing State Housing Trust Funds: Results of a Florida Survey

While their structure and targets vary, state housing trust funds offer an increasingly common form of assistance designed to flexibly meet local housing needs. Frequently they are generated through real estate transaction fees, making them particularly relevant in high growth states such as Florida. For 16 years, Florida's housing trust fund (SHIP) has consistently met its major funding targets, assisting housing initiatives from rural counties to the largest urban centers. A survey of local SHIP administrators provides insight on defining characteristics and key policy dilemmas. Although this critical housing program fails to consistently meet certain goals, those stakeholders involved in its passage, maintenance and implementation consider it a success. Given these conditions, strengthened state oversight to ensure consistency with housing plans and increased state support for other programs, particularly those targeting rental strategies and the lowest income, rather than major legislative changes, could result in more informed, effective and equitable local implementation.

Regulatory Impact Analysis for the Housing Trust Fund

Regulatory Impact Analysis for the Housing Trust Fund

Mental Health Policy and Services Five Years After the President's Commission Report: An Interview With Michael F. Hogan

Mental Health Policy and Services Five Years After the President's Commission Report: An Interview With Michael F. Hogan

Revitalizing the Parramore heritage renovation area: Florida's state housing initiatives partnership program and Orlando's historic African‐American community

Housing programs increasingly contribute to broader community revitalization efforts rather than strictly serving production‐oriented goals. As implementation of this strategy moves beyond the traditional housing leaders in cities such as Boston, Cleveland, and Baltimore, an assessment of other areas is instructive. This article examines how the nation's largest housing trust fund, which Florida directs primarily to local governments through the State Housing Initiatives Partnership (SHIP), contributed to Orlando's ambitious community revitalization effort in the Parramore neighborhood. Given the consistency between SHIP goals and those of the Parramore project and Orlando's experience with developing partnerships and affordable housing initiatives, SHIP should have proven an effective tool. The initial findings demonstrate that housing programs need to be sufficiently flexible to permit a comprehensive approach to neighborhood revitalization. Such an approach should seek a balance between product‐based redevelopment and people‐based housing strategies, expand the role of community development corporations, and create housing choice.

A Survey and Assessment of Housing Trust Funds in the United States

Abstract Housing trust funds in the United States are a state and local response to declining federal support for affordable housing. This article surveys some sample housing trust funds in terms of their basic characteristics, their effectiveness as replacements for federal housing programs, and their replicability. The article concludes that while housing trust funds have the potential to replace federal spending in some jurisdictions, their replication is limited by their dependence on real estate taxes and fees. Moreover, housing trust funds frequently produce small levels of revenue and even at their best fail to come close to equaling the federal level of support for housing prior to the Reagan-Bush budget cuts. Moreover, housing trust funds are less likely than many federal programs to benefit the lowest income households or to provide long-term afford-ability.

Housing Linkage: Regulating Development Impact on Housing Costs

(This article was originally published in 76 Iowa Law Review 1011 (1991)). States and localities are confronted by the pressing need for safe, sanitary, and affordable rental housing for their citizens. Increased demand for low-cost housing aggravated by a sharp decrease in federal incentives to produce affordable rental housing compounds the problem. In response, state and local governments have implemented a number of programs to stimulate production and rehabilitation of affordable rental housing. The concept of housing linkage evolved in the 1980s as a principled way to shift some of the burden of producing affordable rental housing away from government onto private developers.Housing linkage programs require or offer inducements to private developers to produce affordable housing or to pay a sum for development of affordable housing into housing trust funds. One rationale behind housing linkage is that private developers who stand to profit from nonresidential development should assume part of the housing burden that results when development attracts employees, a predictable percentage of whom will need low-cost housing that is not available. Another rationale is that land is an exhaustible resource, therefore nonresidential development necessarily reduces the supply of land available for affordable housing. Thus, private developers must work with government in order to assure that an appropriate amount of land is dedicated to meet community housing needs.Linkage programs derive from efforts to plan for local growth. In some areas, local governments impose “exactions,” requiring developers to dedicate land or pay a fee to provide public services such as water and sewer connections and roads, which were formerly paid for by local government. While exactions were initially developed to provide the physical infrastructure needed for development, their use has been extended in many places to provide “social infrastructure” such as schools and libraries needed by residents. Housing linkage is an extension of this concept. By contrast, localities often negotiate with developers for community benefits on an ad hoc basis during the zoning approval process. An improvement over the ad hoc approach, linkage programs specify the benefits developers are required to provide according to a formula that is uniformly applied to all developers. From a planning perspective, a uniform linkage program is preferable to individually negotiated trade-offs made on projects.This Article asserts that housing linkage is a principled mechanism for offsetting the housing burden imposed on communities by nonresidential development if local governments apply formulas that carefully calculate the impact nonresidential development projects will have on community housing requirements. A predominant theme of this analysis is the adoption of linkage programs as an appropriate means to advance local social values. These values may include the desire to make adequate housing available for citizens of low or modest income, promote economic and racial integration in housing, insure workers who are drawn to particular areas by expanded commercial development have access to affordable housing within a reasonable commuting distance of their workplaces, and impose fairly a greater percentage of the costs of growth on the developers who stand to profit from it. This Article asserts that in states authorizing local governments to regulate development through exactions, courts should defer to the judgment of local officials as long as the means they use to implement their housing programs are reasonable. This Article describes housing linkage, examines several selected programs, and contrasts linkage with other methods of promoting production of affordable housing. It examines trends in linkage and forecasts the ability of housing linkage programs to withstand legal challenges brought by developers on the grounds that the programs lack authorization, violate constitutional guarantees of equal protection or substantive due process, or constitute unconstitutional takings. In conclusion, this Article offers recommendations for localities considering linkage ordinances and for regional legislative approaches.

The Establishment of the San Diego Housing Trust Fund: Lessons for Theory and Practice

In this paper we give an example of a successful interventionist approach in equity planning by presenting the course of action taken, the strategies chosen, the resources utilized, and the skills exhibited by the planners of the City of San Diego Housing Commission in their successful effort to establish a housing trust fund in that city. We suggest that progressive planners can develop and implement redistributive plans under conditions of adversity. To do so, however, they must devise creative strategies that make sense in the context of the prevailing social and political environment by framing the issue in terms responsive to business concerns and by building consensus through the creative accommodation of competing interests. Consensus building, however, can succeed only if the courting of business interests is accompanied by the mobilization of a strong political movement and the building of coalitions in favor of redistributive programs.

A new housing policy for America: recapturing the American dream

This book proposes a comprehensive, innovative, and largely self-financing plan to meet America's housing needs in the 1990s. Showing how current housing policies and housing needs are diametrically opposed, the authors analyze more than two hundred new state, national and international housing efforts to derive a plan that will meet the challenge of U.S. housing and demographic trends in the 1990s. Projecting the special needs of young families, single-parent families, and low- and moderate-income families in the 1990s David Schwartz, Richard Ferlauto, and Daniel Hoffman propose new roles for non-profit organizations and employers. Their new plan advocates a federal down payment assistance loan program, a lease purchase home-buying program, an employer-assisted homeownership plan, a mortgage interest rate buydown fund, shared-equity mortgages, a new National Housing Investment Corporation, and a Federal Housing Trust Fund to construct needed rental units. In addition, special programs are suggested to provide housing help to elderly people, single-parent families, and the homeless. Author note: David C. Schwartz is Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University and a member of the New Jersey General Assembly. Richard C. Ferlauto is a community organizer and legislative analyst who concentrates on housing and community economic development issues. Daniel N. Hoffman is a consultant on housing and urban economic development with The Atlantic Group in New Jersey.