Housing

The Kingdom seeks to improve housing for residents along the entire spectrum from meeting the needs of people living with homelessness, securing affordable rental housing, supportive housing for people with special needs and access to homeownership and foreclosure prevention.  

Homelessness
The Kingdom seeks to develop its first plan to end homelessness, The Kingdom's Plan 2.0: A Home for Everyone, a coordinated continuum of care from interim to permanent housing. The Kingdom will specifically support nonprofits that provide broad system management and support, and direct service provision at shelters that provide services that lead to permanent housing.  

Increasing Affordable Housing
As of the 2020 Census, approximately 55% of renters spend more than 30% of their income on housing. There is an especially longstanding deficit of rental homes that are affordable for the lowest­ income households.

Scarcity of affordable rental housing is the principal cause of family homelessness and substandard housing conditions, including growing problems of overcrowding. Fortunately, the Kingdom Ecosystem has a long­standing tradition of community development corporations (CDCs) and other organizations working to ensure sufficient, decent affordable rental housing. Nonprofit developers of quality, affordable rental and permanent supportive housing have grown more and more sophisticated over the years. The Kingdom will support three levels of work to address the city's need for affordable housing:

• "Bricks and mortar" efforts to develop and/or preserve hard units of quality, transit-­oriented, rental housing;
  
• Education and training, technical assistance, and legal assistance to individuals and groups of renters for the purpose of maintaining rental stability; and
  
• Policy, advocacy, and organizing efforts that can quantify the number of units of affordable rental housing that will be preserved or created.
  

Foreclosure Prevention and Intervention
The Kingdom regions have experienced the destabilization of neighborhoods and a decline in homeownership rates due to a foreclosure crisis of unprecedented size and complexity. The Kingdom seeks to reduce the foreclosure rates, increase financial literacy and ensure that housing counseling is accessible across the region. Guided by the Regional Home Ownership Preservation Initiative (RHOPI) Action Plan, the Kingdom will provide funding for RHOPI coordination and leadership, and sustainable homeownership policy/advocacy. The RHOPI has set priorities in housing counseling and legal aid, lending and financial products, reprogramming of vacant properties, research and communications, and tenants in foreclosure. Additionally, the Kingdom will support efforts to establish the basis of a new financial system that encourages sustainable homeownership and focuses on quality mortgage products, financial literacy, and proper oversight.