Thom Amdur Author Archives

Whenever I meet someone new at an NH&RA conference or industry event, I tend to ask them how they came to the affordable housing business. My unscientific poll results indicate that most of us came to the business via circuitous routes. In my own case, if not for a chance meeting at a Rosh Hashanah brunch 12 years ago with our CFO, I would almost certainly be working in healthcare policy.

States across the country are increasing access to renewable energy sources through support for community solar projects, which create a unique opportunity for developers to reduce their utility costs while bypassing some of the challenges of installing a solar system as part of the property.

For the eight years since the onset of the financial crisis, the economic recovery in the United States has been uneven. Month-to-month we have enjoyed a slow, but steady increase, in the creation of new jobs into the economy, though critics correctly point out that many of these new jobs are not equal replacements for high-paying manufacturing jobs that have migrated overseas. Many real estate markets (and not just on the coasts) are booming, cap rates continue to shrink and the value of rental housing assets (market rate and subsidized) are at all-time highs.

This month’s TCA explores an area of transaction opportunity that I am particularly passionate about. Energy efficiency and sustainability is a rare area where mission, policy, and business opportunity should align, yet there continue to be misconceptions, split incentives and other barriers that sometimes make it difficult to achieve utility efficient outcomes in the real world.

The Novogradac Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Showcase, released in January to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the federal drive to encourage affordable housing, shows the LIHTC program in action by profiling 72 LIHTC developments in 34 states and territories.

At 30 years old, the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit has never looked better according to CohnReznick. The Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Program at Year 30: Recent Investment Performance (2013-2014), the national accounting firm’s look back at the performance of LIHTC properties over the program’s lifetime, as well as at recent trends across the portfolio, delivers good news to both for-profit and non-profit multifamily developers, as well as those who invest in their projects.

In a little less than 11 months there will be a new President of the United States. With the full attention of the political blognescenti on the increasingly raucous Democratic and Republican primaries, it can be easy to ignore that the current Congress and President must still govern. With that in mind, on February 10th President Obama released his Fiscal-Year 2017 budget proposal.

As the economy continues recovering from the Great Recession, the number of families and individuals who rent their homes instead of buying is growing.

What’s the number one issue on the minds of affordable housing’s top executives?

In 2010, a team of ten 16- to 24-year-olds showed up with their tools at a two-story wood-framed building in Providence, Rhode Island. Led by a licensed general contractor, the young adults put skills they had recently learned to work. They mounted new cabinets and counters in the units’ kitchens, installed new vanities in the bathrooms, replaced exterior doors, and re-stained the property, which is owned and managed by The Community Builders.

“This is getting more and more difficult,” said Josh Anderson, Principal at Cedarbend Consulting, as he and other judges decided on the winners for his father’s namesake awards, the J. Timothy Anderson Awards for Excellence in Historic Preservation.

While what they literally built may have varied, each finalist for the 2015 J. Timothy Anderson Awards for Historic Preservation built a bridge. They built a bridge between what communities had and what they needed. In some cases, it was the bridge between yesterday’s industrial heyday and today’s housing shortage.