2018, a Pivotal Year in the Affordable Housing Industry

As discussed in RealWorld 2018 sessions  2018 has been a pivotal year in the Affordable Housing sector under the current administration. With a shortage of 7.2 million affordable housing units and the highest increase in homelessness in almost a decade according to HUD, the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University, and other sources, the need for innovation and simplification has never been greater. In February, HUD Secretary, Ben Carson, declared in the agency report, Strategic Plan Fiscal Years 2018-2022, the department’s goal to “move away from the policies and programs of the past and develop an innovative approach that anticipates the housing needs of the future, while addressing current needs.” Several hundred Affordable industry professionals packed the session on Affordable Industry Updates at RealWorld 2018 to hear HUD’s Housing Program Manager, Lanier Hylton, and other experts address how these changes will directly impact their communities. HUD priority goals, waiting list data and e-signature initiatives HUD has established four broad Agency Priority Goals (APGs) that it expects to achieve over the next two years: Promote economic opportunity for HUD-assisted residents by encouraging self-sufficiency and financial stability, as measured by increasing the proportion of household who exit HUD-assisted housing for positive reasons. Transform assisted housing by transitioning 105,000 additional Public Housing units to a more sustainable platform by the end of FY 2019. Reduce the average length of homelessness in communities by an average of three days by the end of FY 2019. Protect families from lead-based paint and other health hazards by making an additional 23,500 at-risk housing units healthy and lead-safe by the end of FY 2019. The Agency is also implementing some firsts in data retrieval and document management in alignment with these APGs. They include: Tracking waitlist data that will enable...