login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
Whatever Happened to Trump's Housing Affordability Executive Order?
Housing Policy
Whatever Happened to Trump's Housing Affordability Executive Order?
The Trump administration revises wonky federal regulations to reduce home construction costs.
Christian Britschgi | 9.29.2026 2:05 PM
Share on FacebookShare on XShare on RedditShare by emailPrint friendly versionCopy page URL Add Reason to Google
Media Contact & Reprint Requests
(David Calvert/Dreamstime/Midjourney.)
Happy Tuesday, and welcome to another edition of Rent Free. This week's newsletter includes stories on:
The far left winning state elections in Berlin, Germany, on the promise of municipalizing 225,000 private apartment buildings. A zoning and religious freedom case out of Idaho, in which a college founded by controversial "Christian nationalist" pastor Doug Wilson is claiming discrimination at the hands of Moscow planning officials. A new report on how the housing shortage is driving up poverty rates.But first, we have our lead story on the Trump administration's progress on implementing the president's affordable housing executive order.
Much Ado About Stormwater Runoff
Back in March, President Donald Trump issued an executive order directing federal agencies to reduce regulations and red tape affecting the permitting and construction of new housing.
Rent Free Newsletter by Christian Britschgi. Get more of Christian's urban regulation, development, and zoning coverage.
Phone
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
Email(Required)
SUBSCRIBE
As has been discussed in the context of the 21st Century Road to Housing Act, the federal government generally plays a minimal role in setting land use regulations that govern the siting and approval of new homes.
Zoning and permitting are primarily done by local governments.
For the most part, therefore, Trump's "Removing Regulatory Barriers to Affordable Home Construction" order directs agencies to pare back the regulations it attaches to federal housing subsidy programs. It also directs them to advise local and state governments on ways they could increase home construction.
To that latter end, in May, the Department of Housing and Urban Development published a list of "best practices" for state and local governments that encourages them to adopt permitting shot clocks and zone more land for single-family home construction.
(This reflects the second Trump administration's general approach to housing policy, which focuses on encouraging more single-family home construction while saying nothing about increasing residential densities.)
In the same month, the Department of Energy requested input on how it could change its evaluation of state and local building codes to better account for the costs imposed on consumers by energy efficiency standards.
In August, the Department of Agriculture (USDA) also proposed eliminating the energy efficiency standards it imposes on housing subsidized via various rural housing programs. The USDA argued in its proposed rule-making that housing subsidized by those programs already must comply with state and local standards, making federal requirements duplicative.
The real substantive deregulation of private homebuilding activity stemming from the order comes in the area of environmental permitting.
As mentioned, states and localities are the ones who determine where new homes can be built.........
© Reason.com
visit website