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The Power of Leveraging Section 8

The U.S. population is expected to exceed 349 million by 2025, an increase of 67 million people over the year 2000. This unprecedented growth in the U.S. will necessitate tremendous investment in new housing units to accommodate some 32 million households by 2025. As one researcher noted, this new housing stock will be the equivalent to about half of the stock on the ground in 2000 and will come with a price tag of roughly $30 trillion.

1 The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) estimates that nearly six million households (more than 5% of our population) face “critical housing needs.” In considering how our country will develop new housing for our growing population, it is essential, therefore, that we think creatively about how we will invest in affordable housing in particular.

2 Resources are scarce: federal budget constraints and priorities for funding military operations have put great pressure on state and local housing budgets, and have necessitated increasingly innovative state, local and private partnerships to preserve and build affordable units. This report will explain how Section 8 increment financing offers one model to leverage public resources and yield a greater number of homes affordable to low income households without additional cost to the federal government.