Caitlin Jones • 8 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: For housing authorities, municipalities, and other governmental entities that self-develop and desire to provide government-owned affordable housing, including workforce housing, Build America Bonds (Direct Payment BABs) provide a new financing vehicle to do this. Authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), Direct Payment BABs can provide significant cost savings over previous options to finance rental housing that addresses specific local housing needs. These needs might include workforce housing, mixed-income housing, and housing targeted toward first responders, teachers, firefighters, police officers, and hospital workers.
Caitlin Jones • 4 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: Homeless families in Long Beach, Calif., are getting a new lease on life, thanks to a $32 million affordable housing development opened by Century Housing Corporation in December.
Caitlin Jones • 2 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009:
Congress in recent weeks has been busy on several fronts in the area of affordable housing. Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, released a draft of a major housing preservation bill that was discussed at hearings by the full committee and its housing subcommittee. During July, the full committee also marked up a bill (H.R. 3045) to reform the federal Section 8 voucher program. Separately, Frank introduced a bill (H.R. 3068) that would direct dividends paid by firms assisted under the Troubled Asset Relief Program for use for certain housing purposes. The bill would direct $1 billion to the National Housing Trust Fund and $1.5 billion to the Neighborhood Stabilization Program.
Caitlin Jones • 5 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: Thinking of installing a renewable energy system in an historic building?
The concept may sound impossible, even ludicrous, particularly for a renovation project seeking to qualify for the federal historic rehabilitation tax credit.
But these kinds of rehabilitation projects are possible, with the right building and approach, according to experts.
Caitlin Jones • 6 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: On June 23, 1986, Senator George J. Mitchell addressed his colleagues from the floor of the U.S. Senate. Much was at stake that day. Congress was in the midst of debating the Tax Reform Act of 1986, which would become the most sweeping reform of the Internal Revenue Code in a generation. Senator Mitchell spoke eloquently about a new program – the low-income housing tax credit – intended to use federal tax credits to attract private capital to invest in much needed affordable rental housing. Senators from both sides of the aisle rose in support of this new program. That year, the low-income housing tax credit (LIHTC) program was signed into law under a Republican President, Republican Senate, and Democratic House of Representatives.
Caitlin Jones • 3 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009:
Caitlin Jones • 6 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: The federal government has issued additional guidance to states for the Tax Credit Assistance Program (TCAP) and the Section 1602 credit exchange program.
The new guidance is but one of several recent new developments. Others include the first formal funding commitments to projects under TCAP, a legislative expansion of the TCAP program, and the release of a set of principles to guide states in the operation of the two new programs.
Caitlin Jones • 5 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: “Diversity has helped us in this last real estate boom-to-bust,” says developer Chickie Grayson, president and CEO of Baltimore, Md.-based Enterprise Homes, Inc., referring to the organization’s shift in development strategy.
Caitlin Jones • 1 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development on 6/23/09 released new changes (Change 3) to HUD Handbook 4350.3 (Occupancy Requirements of Subsidized Multifamily Housing Programs). They are effective 8/1/09. Some of the changes impact HUD projects only; others both HUD and low-income housing tax credit projects.
Caitlin Jones • 3 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: Problems in the multifamily rental housing sector, including weakening demand, are likely to worsen at least for the short term, suggests the new annual housing report from the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University.
Caitlin Jones • 5 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: Hope House, a nonprofit residential treatment center for male alcoholics and substance abusers in Boston’s South End, is a renewable facility in several ways.
Caitlin Jones • 7 min read
Tax Credit Advisor, August 2009: Newly implemented changes made by this year’s economic stimulus act promise new opportunities and shifts in the use of federal renewable energy tax credits. This applies both for real estate projects where the energy credits are used alone, and where paired with federal low-income housing, historic preservation, or new markets tax credits. (See p. 11 for chart on federal energy tax credits.)