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The Biden administration announced an initiative Friday to speed the conversion of underutilized commercial and office space into housing by providing new financing and technical assistance to developers, and by promoting the sale of surplus government property that has the potential to be redeveloped for housing.
The White House outlined more than 20 federal programs across six federal agencies that can be used to support office-to-housing conversions in a new 54-page Commercial to Residential Federal Resources Guidebook. The programs, including low-interest loans, loan guarantees, grants and tax incentives, can make conversion projects more attractive to developers.
Federal officials will hold training workshops this fall for local and state governments, real estate developers, owners, builders and lenders on how to use federal programs for commercial to residential conversions.
Adrianne Todman
“With a shortage of millions of homes nationwide, we need to utilize every resource at our disposal to increase housing supply,” Deputy Secretary of Housing Adrianne Todman said in a statement.
The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued expanded guidance on how Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funding can be used on a wide range of housing-related activities, including acquiring and rehabilitating properties for commercial-to-residential conversions. States and local governments can access up to five times their annual CDBG allocation in low-cost loan guarantees to fund projects such as the conversion of properties to housing or mixed-use development, HUD said.
Q2 2023 commercial vacancy rates, by market
Vacancy…