Every once in a while, I’ve posted information about the cost of subsidized housing.
Always because the cost per unit is outrasgeous.
Now comes “A City That Works” with a takedown of its subsidized housing program:
Last year subsidized housing in Chicago cost $679,000 per unit.
Houston does it for half the price.
Of course, Texas state government does not burden its public construction to prevailing wage requirements.
And housing in the state’s program costs 15% less.
But the state could cut costs, except for the these requirements:
It’s true that IHDA has a more predictable scoring rubric for projects. Unfortunately, that rubric still heavily prioritizes everything-bagel requirements that drive up costs. For the general scoring track, 10% of points are awarded for extra accessibility features, 13% are awarded for additional energy efficiency criteria, 15% are awarded based on the makeup of the development team, and an extra 4% are headed out to non-profit developers. Only 3% of scorecard points are awarded based on project cost...
Cost containment should get one of the largest weights on IHDA’s scorecard, rather than the smallest. If costs were 30-40% of the score, developers would have a real incentive to design around them – making a million little tradeoffs or decisions in partnership with their architects, contractors, and suppliers that IHDA staff would never come up with on their own.
