Affordable Housing Trust Fund

Habitat for Humanity supports a national affordable housing trust fund as a new source of revenue that will assist in the production of new housing and the preservation or rehabilitation of existing housing that is affordable. Ideally, an affordable housing trust fund would provide a permanent, ongoing source of revenue that is not taken from an existing federal resource.

• The trust fund should be targeted to provide housing for families with incomes below 80 percent of Area Median Income (AMI).
• Habitat for Humanity hopes that an affordable housing trust fund will create both rental and ownership units. We are advocating for jurisdictions to be allowed to use up to 25 percent of an affordable housing trust fund for affordable ownership units.
• Multi-family rental housing funded through a trust fund should have an affordability requirement attached to it which would determine the number of years a unit financed through the fund must remain affordable. Habitat supports a 50-year affordability requirement for a trust fund for these projects.
• Habitat for Humanity has supported the idea that the trust fund would be distributed through a formula allocation to states and localities. States and localities would, in turn, distribute the funds to state and local groups, similar to the distribution of many federal block grant programs.
• Grantees receiving funds through the trust fund should be required to match the federal funds.
• The use of funds from an affordable housing trust fund should be flexible to ensure compatibility with other federal housing programs.
• Preference should be given for projects that use energy efficiency standards and green building principles.