How updating a few musty housing laws can promote the smart, affordable housing options we need across fast-growing Northwest towns and cities.
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Affordable housing is lacking across the Northwest, with housing policy here effectively excluding from the market many lower-cost options for low-income families and individuals. A raft of outdated laws bans the types of residential arrangements that once housed most of the North American working class and prohibits modest home options near jobs, transit, schools, and neighborhood centers—from mother-in-law apartments and triplexes to rooms that were safe, comfortable, and convenient but small and basic.
As a result, families may scrimp on food or heat to be sure they can pay rent each month; they may opt for black-market housing; or they may even go homeless. Everyone deserves a clean, safe place to live; but beyond safety regulations, the floor plans mandated by current housing rules aren’t affordable for everyone. In this series, Sightline researchers explore the key laws that prevent smart, affordable housing arrangements of the past from getting to market today, and look to a Northwest revival of inexpensive housing options.
This article is part of the series Legalizing Inexpensive Housing Pro-housing state lawmakers hoping to ease Washington’s dire housing shortage tried something new this year: the offer of a financial incentive to cities if they opt to allow more homes by loosening their zoning laws. Cities embraced the approach, in stark contrast to their typical hostility to any state … Read more
Strange as it may seem in a country that might be headed for double-digit home price hikes in the next two years, many US cities make it illegal for groups of people to share big houses. But that will no longer be the case in Oregon. On Monday, that state’s Senate approved House Bill 2583 … Read more
If the government pays hundreds of millions of dollars to help build and operate a high-quality transit line, people should generally be allowed to live near it if they want to. You’d think this would be uncontroversial. Especially among people who run public transit agencies. Unfortunately, some transit leaders here in Oregon seem to be … Read more
President Joe Biden wants you to lift your bans on duplexes, apartments, and car-free homes.
In 2020, Portland legalized sixplexes citywide. A 2021 follow-up would allow driveway RVs and clustered tiny homes.
When thousands of people are living in tents and doorways, it makes no sense for the government to stop people from living indoors. But that’s exactly what some cities and counties do by capping the number of “unrelated occupants” who can legally share a home, no matter how large. Both Oregon and Washington are considering … Read more
When is Seattle going to fix microhousing? David Neiman and his daughter look at data over time resulting from city policy changes.
Washington state legislators eye three new state-wide strategies to incentivize cities to adopt local abundant housing rules and tackle the state’s affordability crisis by addressing the home shortage.
Our families and living groups come in all shapes and sizes. Some households need more than six bedrooms. Cities shouldn’t replace a bad cap on household size with a bad cap on room count.
