Can Co-Buying Help Solve The Affordability Crisis?

Grove Park Renewal aims to help residents from the majority-black area of northwest Atlanta become homeowners by turning vacant properties into newly renovated, affordable homes. The nonprofit also offers an affordable rental program that allows qualifying individuals and families to live in one of its properties at a more affordable, income-adjusted rate.

The CHN Housing Partners’ lease-purchase program builds affordable homes for low-income individuals to rent. Residents live and pay rent in the homes for 15 years while taking homeownership and financial counseling courses to equip them with the knowledge and skills necessary to become homeowners. Over the past 30 years, CHN has built more than 1,700 lease-purchase homes and more than 1,600 of them have been sold to owner-occupants.

Volunteers of the PDX Housing Solidarity Project are working to redistribute generational wealth through homeownership in Portland. The project connects people with ample resources to Black and Indigenous homebuyers and helps facilitate cash gifts, no-interest loans, or other ways to assist throughout the process.

Programs like the federal Housing Choice Voucher Program — or Section 8 — and the Fort Wayne Housing Authority’s Family Self-Sufficiency Program help low-income individuals and families afford quality homes through participating private landlords and housing developments. With the voucher program, the tenant’s financial obligation is capped at about 30% of their annual gross income, while the voucher covers the rest. In some cases, the voucher can cover up to 100% of the tenant’s rent.

In Seattle, Homestead Community Land Trust and Habitat for Humanity Seattle-King County help low-income residents buy homes using a community land trust model. Residents who make under 80% of the local median income can purchase a home at a rate far below the median home price in the city from a set portfolio of homes.

Many subprime borrowers in the United States are financially unable to buy a home themselves. An unconventional lender is trying to make it easier for low-income people to buy houses despite the tighter requirements that other lenders adopted after the mortgage bust.

An innovative program by an unusual bank allows low-income people in Cambodia to take out a 15-year fixed mortgage with little or no documentation - contradicting traditional loan assumptions and creating means for some of the country's poorest people to completely change their lives. The bank and its investors are now making a profit, and more than 700 mortgages and building loans have been provided.

As rents in Madison, Wisconsin, skyrocket, alternative housing options are emerging. One such option is cohousing, a form of community living in which residents live in multiple units. One unit, Linden Cohousing, has 75 members living across its 45 units, enjoying not only affordable housing but also the community aspect of cohousing. Madison currently has four active cohousing communities, with more on the way.

The John C. Anderson Apartments is a LGBTQ+ friendly, senior facility in Philadephia, Pennsylvania, that gives residents an affordable place to feel safe and be with their peers.

The Boise nonprofit, LEAP, builds affordable housing with innovative approaches, including using donated land held in trust and solar panels to keep utility costs low. The creative approach to land ownership and the use of alternative construction techniques and materials help more people afford homes in a fast-growing metro area.