Wyoming refund exposes legal risk for local housing fee ordinances

Small wins on impact fees occasionally occur in costly U.S. housing markets. Teton County, Wyoming, officials agreed last week to refund a $24,325 “affordable workforce housing” fee that a homeowner had to pay to obtain a permit to build a single-family home. The payment settles a lawsuit the homeowner filed last year in a Wyoming […]

Housing muni market swells amid affordability policy debate

Financing affordable housing development – typically for lower-income households – is one of the most challenging matters in real estate. Making the economics work on a deal requires layered “hard and soft” funding sources as developers navigate rising costs, policy instability, and structural gaps in the subsidy system. The process is so complicated that professionals […]

Trump executive order targets regulatory barriers to homebuilding

The White House announced on Friday afternoon its effort to challenge what it calls “unnecessary regulatory barriers” to homebuilding by issuing a broad executive order to reduce environmental, permitting and programmatic restrictions that federal officials say are contributing to the nation’s housing affordability crisis. The order, signed by Donald Trump, directs multiple federal agencies to […]