Yesterday, an article appeared in the Boston Globe about President Barack Obama’s plan to use around $4 billion of economic stimulus money to create new affordable housing nationwide. According to the author, this marked a watershed movement as the new administration decidedly moves away from the “ownership society” initiatives of the Bush years.
The plan will use the $4 billion (of the total $14 billion stimulus funds granted to HUD) to create more affordable rental housing by converting foreclosed into rental units and constructing new low-rise apartment buildings. HUD will use another $4 billion to refurbish the nation’s existing public housing stock of 1.2 million units and announced on July 28th that $2.25 billion of stimulus cash was already spent or “in action” on completing stalled public housing projects. That bridge financing will provide funding where private capital, usually incentivized by LIHTC has dried up.
New York City will be the first city to begin construction use stimulus money to actually start new public housing projects, using $60 million to begin construction on apartments in Harlem and East New York, reported Multi Housing News today.
What do people think about this? Is this a good use of money?
The Housing Choice Voucher Program, which supplies Section 8 apartments to renters, has generally been thought to be a much better solution than housing projects. The short term need for new jobs in the construction sector and the need to do something with foreclosed homes besides letting them fall into disrepair seem to be the chief reasons for this new HUD expenditure, rather than some ideological shift on the housing front.
im 21 need a cheap apt or studio
Where are you located? If you go to http://www.mynewplace.com and enter your city or zip code, you’ll get a list of available apartments in your area. From there, you can narrow your results by choosing number of bedrooms, price range, etc. Best of luck, and let us know if you need help using the site!
Julia
craigslist is the best so far. I want to move to Arizona for heath reasons. I am alone and probably will be for the rest of my life by choice because of my disability. less stress that way. I only make 960 a month. Section 8 didnt pic me..They shouldnt any way..They really should go to struggling( not by choice) parents. If Barak Obamah wins, I hope he doesnt allow legislators to put a stop on my raises, decrease my pay again for another 4 yrs again.He threaten to withhold it altogether (cant remember if it was last yr or the yr before) just because republicans wouldnt sign an unseen budget cut: That was really scary!!..My knees were knockin..All I could think about was the old folks in nyc and other places like it that were on oxigen tanks.I thought demacrat was for helping people on ss. ssd. medicaid and all that. Before George Bush left office, he doubled our raise. He must have known something the little people didnt. Idk.
craigslist is better