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The House recently approved a motion to go to conference to reconcile differences between the House and Senate versions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and announced the members who will serve on the House conference committee. At this time, the Senate has not yet voted to go to conference, but it is expected to take this step soon.
Here is an overview of the House and Senate tax reform bills impacting the LIHTC industry and affordable housing:
A recent blog post by Kermit Baker and Alexander Hermann of the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University looked at losses from natural disasters over the last 12 years. They found that the total cost of the natural disasters that occurred in 2017, including Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria, could exceed disaster-related damages from any year in the last two decades.
An amendment to the Senate tax bill added by Senator Pat Roberts, the Republican senior senator from Kansas, would strike artists’ housing from the list of qualified groups who can benefit from federally subsidized low-income housing. It would forbid developers from LIHTCS to build affordable housing with a preference for artists.
A group of lawmakers from Washington state recently introduced legislation to increase the LIHTC by 50 percent, which could result in as many as 400,000 more affordable housing units over 10 years. Congresswoman Suzan DelBene introduced the bill along with cosponsors Reps. Adam Smith and Pramila Jayapal. All of them represent King County, where housing demand and costs have skyrocketed in recent years. In Washington state, nearly 400,000 households pay half their income...
According to a recent report from Freddie Mac, the number of available affordable multifamily units has fallen alarmingly over the last six years. A combination of rising rents and stagnant household income is exacerbating the problem, and it could get worse yet if action isn’t taken to increase the supply of affordable rental units to keep up with growing demand, according to research released by Freddie Mac Multifamily.
U.S. Senator Tim Kaine recently announced that he is joining his colleagues Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT) to co-sponsor the Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act of 2017, a bill that would boost affordable housing options for low-income families in Virginia.
The IRS recently announced that it has provided temporary relief from certain requirements of the Internal Revenue Code to allow owners and operators of LIHTC sites located anywhere in the United States and its possessions to provide temporary emergency housing to individuals who are displaced by a major disaster from their principal residences, regardless of income. In addition to normally applicable LIHTC income limits, the IRS has authorized owners and operators to d...
A recent report by the NYU Furman Center entitled “2017 National Rental Housing Landscape: Renting in the Nation’s Largest Metros” examined rental housing trends from 2006 to 2015 in the 53 metropolitan areas with populations over one million in 2015, with a particular focus on the economic recovery period beginning in 2012.
Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Jose have added pressure on Congress to assist in the recovery efforts of the affected areas. And industry experts have pointed out the effectiveness of the LIHTC program to direct private capital into affected areas.
Reps. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.) and Bill Pascrell Jr. (D-N.J.) have reintroduced the National Disaster Tax Relief Act, first introduced as H.R. 3110 in 2015. The bill would provide relief for disasters from 2012 to 2015 and make certain provisions permanent. When Reed and Pascrell introduced it in July 2015, it garnered 41 co-sponsors.
If enacted, areas that experienced federally declared disasters from 2012 – 2015 would receive additional allocations of LIHTCs. Eac...