Senate Advances Sweeping Housing Bill, Includes Ban On Institutional Buyers Of Single-Family Homes
The Senate this week is advancing a wide-ranging package that could become the biggest legislative action taken on housing in decades.
The latest version of the Senate's bill pairs legislative efforts around affordability and housing production with a Trump administration objective to ban institutional investment in single-family homes.
On Monday, Sens. Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat from Massachusetts, and Tim Scott, a Republican from South Carolina, released the latest version of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, which comes out of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee.
The bill passed its first procedural hurdle Monday evening, garnering bipartisan support with a vote of 84-6, Politico reported.
The Senate bill largely resembles a previous version the chamber had passed in October that didn't get passed into law. Politico reported that 36 of the 40 provisions are the same as the previous Senate bill. It also largely overlaps with a House bill that was passed in early February.
The Senate bill still needs to pass a final vote and be combined with the House bill before it heads to the president's desk. The next procedural vote is expected as soon as Wednesday, Politico reported.
The most significant addition to this latest version of the bill is a provision to prevent institutional investors from buying up single-family homes, a goal President Donald Trump began pushing in January. The president signed an executive order tasking agencies to prepare guidance to prevent federal assistance to institutional investors buying homes.
The bill defines an institutional investor as a company that owns 350 or more homes, and it has exemptions to the single-family acquisition ban, including homes that are built to rent, Politico reported.
The White House released a statement Monday saying if the Senate’s new bill were to pass as written, the president’s advisers would recommend that he sign it. It had previously expressed concern with the House bill not including the institutional investor ban.
Among the many sections in the Senate bill is a provision that would simplify the National Environmental Protection Act review process for certain housing projects to reduce delays in starting construction.
The bill would also require the Federal Housing Administration to increase multifamily loan limits.
It also includes a section to change the definition of manufactured housing in a way that seeks to spur more construction of the product type. And it includes sections aimed at supporting more housing development in opportunity zones and in Community Development Block Grant jurisdictions.
Warren said in a statement the bill will “boost housing supply and bring down costs,” and she called it a “step to rein in corporate landlords that are squeezing families out of homeownership.”
Scott said “not only is this bill about cutting regulatory red tape, lowering costs, and expanding housing supply while generating no new spending, but it’s about making sure people like the single mom who raised me in North Charleston, South Carolina, have even greater access to economic opportunity and the American dream of homeownership.”
The National Multifamily Housing Council and National Apartment Association, the industry's top two trade groups, supported prior versions of the bill but didn't immediately comment on the latest Senate version. NAA Assistant Vice President of Federal Legislative Affairs Owen Caine previously said the version of the ROAD to Housing bill that advanced in October was the most significant housing legislation to come out of the Senate Banking Committee in at least three decades.
