News

The Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies will release its annual State of the Nation’s Housing Report on November 19 and host a release event from 4-5 p.m. ET.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently published a report on Opportunity Zones (OZ’s), which calls on Congress to consider providing Treasury with authority and responsibility to collect data and report on OZ’s performance.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) announced that the 2021 multifamily loan purchase caps for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the Enterprises) will be $70 billion for each Enterprise. NH&RA applauds the increased caps and looking forward to working with FHFA, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to ensure sufficient liquidity in the multifamily mortgage market during this economic downturn.

Don Layton authored a new paper with Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies, What Should We Do with the GSEs? Common-Sense Reform Recommendations for the Biden Administration. Layton concludes that the new administration, if it is to successfully address the GSE question, must follow one of two possible paths in the next twelve to twenty-four months.

On November 9, Freddie Mac CEO David Brickman notified the company’s board of directors that he would resign as CEO, effective January 8. Michael Hutchins has been appointed interim President of the company effective November 16, 2020.

The Senate returned this week and hit the ground running with Fiscal Year (FY) 2021 appropriations. Funding for the federal government runs out on December 11 and both Republicans and Democrats have stated their desire for full FY 2021 appropriation, as opposed to another short-term or long-term continuing resolution. A COVID-19 relief package and a tax bill are widely seen as the other must-dos during the lame-duck session. All three legislative vehicles provide opportunities to attach LIHTC priorities. We’ll continue to monitor the latest developments and engage our members when action is needed.

The jockeying for cabinet and leadership positions within a Biden administration is well underway. We’ll keep a running list of names that are rumored to be in consideration, but note that this list already is out-of-date the second it is published, and that NH&RA is not endorsing any potential candidate, but rather relaying the potential candidates that we’re aware of.

In response to the continuing COVID-19 pandemic, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) published Revenue Procedure 2020-49, which provides temporary guidance on the statutory public approval requirement for tax-exempt qualified private activity bonds. The revenue procedure extends the time period during which telephonic hearings satisfy the public approval requirement from December 31, 2020, until September 30, […]

HUD successfully completed the CNA e-Tool Version 3.0 installation and data conversion. The CNA e-Tool User Interface has been re-platformed to the cloud and the most important result is that users must now enter all data in the web application, not the Excel Assessment Tool, which is now retired.

FHFA determined the Enterprises’ purchases of mortgages exceeded the benchmarks for all the 2019 housing goals. The report also concluded both Enterprises complied with their 2019 Duty-to-Serve requirements in all three underserved markets.

Most older Americans do not reside in livable communities, according to a joint report from the Harvard Joint Center on Housing Studies and the AARP Public Policy institute. The report said most seniors do not reside in places that score high on AARP’s Livability Index, which measures economic and social environments among other factors.

The Department of the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service posted a proposed rule on the Average Income minimum set-aside election. The proposed rule would require properties electing the average income minimum set-aside to designate the imputed income limit of each low-income unit no later than the close of the first taxable year of the LIHTC period. To avoid noncompliance and recapture, owners would only be allowed to take mitigating steps with 60 days of year-end.