Congress Takes Historic Step on Housing Affordability with Bipartisan ROAD to Housing Act

Passed unanimously out of the Senate Banking Committee, the ROAD to Housing Act embraces solutions to the housing affordability crisis like zoning reform and streamlining rules to encourage more homebuilding.

For the first time since the foreclosure crisis, U.S. Congress has taken meaningful action to make housing more affordable and homeownership more achievable for Americans with the ROAD to Housing Act.

For over a decade, housing affordability has been a distant priority for congress. The prevailing view was that housing was a local issue, best left to city councils and mayors. But housing is now a national crisis. From California to Wisconsin to Florida and New York, housing has become too expensive for working families to afford.

The great accomplishment of the ROAD to Housing Act is that it proves we can make people better off without spending big. We just have to use logic, and listen to experts who have been promoting solutions like zoning reform and permitting streamlining for years. The bill passed out of the Senate Banking Committee 24-0—fully bipartisan—and uses smart incentives to encourage local governments to build more housing.

The most meaningful part of this bill is the push to tie federal dollars to local governments to build more homes. That’s the kind of incentive that can move zoning, permitting and approvals in places where supply has been stuck for years.

The bill’s support for manufactured and modular housing is also important. Those are some of the fastest, most cost‑effective ways to add new homes, including ADUs and tiny homes.

There has been a lot of attention on capping the number of homes large investors can buy, but that provision won’t move the needle on the broader housing shortage. What will matter is keeping build‑to‑rent in the mix. Removing that ban preserves a flexible path for new housing supply.

The ROAD to Housing Act won’t be a silver bullet. There are still many challenges when it comes to housing affordability, such as a lack of construction labor, rising insurance costs, high land values, but this legislation proves that we can make progress, and we can make the American people better off.

As of now, the ROAD to Housing Act is in limbo. President Trump canceled plans to sign the bill on Wednesday, though the bill may come into law without his signature.