My thanks to Kim Duty at National Multi Housing Council for tweeting today's Washington Post article titled "Obama's next focus of reform: Housing finance". One statement by HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan especially catches the eye. In being identified by the Post as the "most out front in the administration in advocating a new approach", he stated that "While we continue to promote affordable homeownership, for many Americans, renting will continue to be the only or preferred option,"
The Post article opened the discussion to supporters of rental housing who "say they perceive an early but markedly different tone from the Obama administration." Vincent O'Donnell of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation is quoted as commenting that "My impression is that the administration at pretty much every level is serious about a balanced policy. Their purpose is to look at and make more workable rental housing programs."
Is this an actual wakeup call by the White House to Congress whose members are so consumed by the home ownership crisis that they cannot even focus upon the multiple crises in the multifamily housing industry? In this writer's opinion, the strategy of placing 100% of the housing recovery effort on single-family homes in the suburbs is incredibly short-sighted and demonstrates a very poor understanding of the critical importance of rental housing in this country. As previously written here, this ill-fated prejudice may be 100% politically motivated.
It is apparent that Secretary Donovan really gets it. The further degradation of multifamily properties which provides the only affordable housing option for tens of millions of families in this country is a pending social catastrophe of epic proportions. Where are the self-appointed friends of affordable housing in Congress now?