Development and the director of the federal Housing Finance agency testified on increasing housing supply and reducing cost for borrowers. This before the Senate Banking committee. Its one hour 45 minutes. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] the committee on banking Housing Urban Affairs is called to order. Thanks for theo two witnesses joining us. Home is a lot more than four walls and roof. Home is where you go after long day at work. Home is where your kids play and do their homework. Home is where you plan for the future and build wealth. Home is a millions of families join the middle class. Our homes are an anchor in our lives, but for too many families around the country i home they can afford to c build the life around just just out of reach. I hear in ohio. I hear from people in lima city summer to why growth in mansfield were a new building with feet for 54 apartments for working families just opened. For the 64 apartments they had 511 interested families. I hear it from rural Washington County in southeast ohio. Marietta l prechurch down where they struggled for years to build 48 homes for seniors. I threw it in Franklin County in central ohio, columbus, with a population has grown by 40 o more than 1. 3 million people. That housing supply hasnt kept up and prices have been rising for years and years. With more people with not enough home for homes, 40 of renters in this country pay more than they can afford for housing. And that county with its worldclass schools and skilled workforce, its grey colgan flight only will continue to cook. I hear the stories from across ohio. Its not just happening in ohio. Whether youre in downtown columbus or minneapolis or wirral south dakota or wyoming or South Carolina, the problem is too expensive. It has been for years. Its been for far too long. One big reason is we dont have enough of it for the past decade, the past decade rick has got up and up and up. One in four renters pay more than half their income for rent, and when more than half of your income goes to read, every month its hard to juggle all the bills you already have let alone say for a down payment. High rent stops people from becoming homeowners. So many families think if i i could come up with a down payment. The money for a down payment is what stands between millions of americans the dream of homeownership Home Ownership and building generational wealth. Ng thats why my bill to support firstgeneration homebuyers down payment toward equity act with senator warnock and the helper act aimed specifically at, the down payment towardd equity act is broader. The helper act for teachers, firefighters and Police Officers to allow them to buy homes in their communities and other sources of down payment assistance. All of that is so important. Secretary todman, director thompson, you know these challenges because your agencys are at the center of our office of her efforts to lower the cost of housing. Your agencys dont build housing budget on the front lines of our Housing Markets. Your j job is to make sure thers affordable financing for the housing the builders and Housing Providers create, that families can get a mortgage to buy their firstom home, and that as americans get older they can still it safely in their homes. And both of your agencys about changes that should help increase housing supply and bring down costs. Following call from senator reed and me and others, hud acted to improve access to financing for affordable rental housing through fha and theci federal financing bank. The fall of housing in state build and preserve more Affordable Housing for renters across the country. Huds longoverdue update to loan limits for manufactured housing, its new guidance to support conversion of all office basedom into homes will open up new Housing Options, especially in cities like cleveland. You put the limited upfront fees the fannie and freddie have in the past charge low income firsttime homebuyers and borrowers who could not afford a big down payment to begin with. You also refocus fannie and freddie and the Federal Home Loan Banks on the rolls notches in Financial Markets markets but in helping to support housing for families and communities need. But the fact remains housing prices are still far s too high. They have been for years and years. It will take all of us working together housing provider, federal, state and local governments to lower costs. Afpak and fhfa need to do more to be vigilant and ensuring that tax money is actually serving families, not enriching shady landlords and wealthy investors. In ohio and around the country wall street firms and other outside investors swoop into community is, they buy properties, they victims, drive up local housing prices. We should pass my stop predatory investing act to end their tax breaks for buying up numbers of singlefamily homes. To ensure that all i housing agencies are on the same page and working to stop not in any way supporting this predatory Business Model. State and local governments have a lot of influence over the housing into committees and morc and more seeds and cams are making changes like updates to zoning, like shortening lengty approval process, processes to open up housing come to open up opportunities for new housing, expand access to affordable homeownership. Hud is a critical part inrs supporting that work. Earlier this year Franklin County commissioner kevin boyce testified in the said on behalf of the National Association of countiesof about their Critical Role that homes cbg and the Housing Trust fund play in helping counties of every size to address housing needs. Local committees depend on this partnership or even with more housing some families working lowwage jobs and some seniors on fixed incomes still will not make enough to afford [inaudible] sorry . What was at . Sorry. Assistant programs are critical to keep with affordable. [inaudible] youve never done this. Well done. [laughing] im almost done, senator scott. Take a time, mr. Chairman. Hud needs make sure they would effectively and efficiently to serve on committees and protect our investment. Congress need to do our part. Last but this committee had hearing a legislative proposals to help expand ourar housing supply and bring down the cost of housing. We must continue our bipartisan work to move forward, since proposals that will help expand Housing Options and reduce costs. I look forward to continue to work with Ranking Member scott on this committee toward that goal. I t look for doing today from te two leaders before its about what they have done, what more they can do, what resources they need to get their input on what congress can do to make housing more affordable for renters and for homeowners. Ranking member scott spec thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you for serving you. Acting secretary, congratulations. 30 days, long time. So we expect you to be completely prepared for everything were going to talk about over the next couple of hours. Likely. Thank you, mr. Chairman for holding this hearing. I been asking for about a year to have both of you in front of us, so its certainly something that i think its absolutely essential for us to be able to hear from our regulators as often as possible to achieve the goal of american homeownership because mark megan homeowns not just homeownership. It is a fact in the eyes of so Many Americans the American Dream. If youre going to close the wealth gap that we talk so much about that is so processing, one of the wasted it is by creating equity and creating equity would come to membership as much as it does any other place in our economy, so thank you both for being here. Homeownership, consistently, americans owe somewhere around somewhere amount 12 trillion on their mortgages. Mortgage debt accounts for 70 plus of Consumer Debt in the United States of america. Not an insignificant amount of money. And yet, the last time we had this hearing was back during the trump years when chairman crapo was chairman of this committee. I certainly hope we have more opportunities you from both of you at the same time going forward. The American Dream of Home Ownership is further out of reach today than it was just a few years ago despite the subsidies the trillions of dollars we spent over the decades, little has changed in 1970 homeownership and america was 64 today it is 65 rate since the passage of the Fair Housing Act in 1968 the goal was to eliminate housing discrimination. The homeownership rate for African Americans has not changed much, 41 , 44 , it continues to have a very slow growth trajectory. Our housing regulators must testify up more often so that we can find ways to deal with the challenges that housing presents to so Many Americans. But sincePresident Bidens takee Mortgage Rates have ballooned by 150 . Rent have gone up about 20 . Homelessness is up 12 in a single year. The highest number on record in the history of our country despite empty promises from the white house about helping working families the simple fact is the housing under this administration has skyrocketed. I see that at home in South Carolina and i see that across the nation as i travel. I see that in families worried about how to make ends meet watching the dream of homeownership seemed further and further and further away. What has become apparent as this administration about affordability and housing has failed to line up with their policies. Reckless spending on progressive wish list fueled runaway inflation and now americans are painfully aware biden mixes not help them. Instead burdened them so much. The mountains of red tape and regulations this administration has put on Housing Providers are only making that matter so much worse. Officially, both hud and f hfa have taken several politicized actions that will unnecessary increase the cost for families and burden communities. I have recently imposed rent controls on low Income Housing tax credit properties. F hfa is Public Comments on policies enclosing correct rent controlviolent direction fe house. What do these policies mean in practice . They have the potential to limit the number of people served by these programs and restrict the supply of Affordable Housing. Decades of research have improvement rent control policies make housing supply and affordability issues worse, not better. This is the type of backward logic americans have come to expect from joe biden and biden makes. Second, hud and joined other federal agencies under this administration in attempting to add climate regulator to the list of duties. For instance hud proposed requiring all newly constructed subsidized housing be built to increase Energy Efficiency standards, even though hud itself admits lower income households may not be able to afford the added burdens of additional cost. According to the National Association of homebuilders these new environmental mandates could cost as much as 31000 to each new home. So, the same time a families facing doubling of sometimes tripling food costs in order to meet the green claimant goals this administration saddles them with an extra 31000 of additional expenses for a single home. Families and communities like the one i grew up in cannot afford new claimant costs that increases the cost of housing. Which brings me too my last example it appears this administration have been embraced by her housing regulators. Last year hud proposed a rule encouraging cities applying for federal funds to remove crime free ordinances local laws that keep a rental communities safe by keeping out convicted criminals. Even worse hud proposed a rule last week that will make it easier for criminals to lip and hud subsidized housing which risks making communities less safe. We need to reverse course and take a different road when it comes to federal housing policy that is why i announced housing is one of my Top Priorities for this year as a Ranking Member of this committee. Since our first hearing last april i focused my efforts on building consensus around the commonsense non partisan reforms to all segments of our Housing Market including my road to housing act. I continue to urge consideration might road into a housing act which takes a conference in view of federal housing policy re centers support around families, helping those who are homeless or renting or prepared to buy a house. It has a past time to consider my legislation along with other commonsense and bipartisan proposals that would include Real Solutions to tackle housing challenges. I look forward to and from both of the Witnesses Today and i look forward to having an eager conversation about some of the challenges so Many Americans face as it relates to building on their version of the American Dream. Thank you et cetera scott. Adrian todman welcome as his acting secretary of hud. She was confirmed as deputy secretary 2021 and prior to her service their acting secretary with National Association of housing and redevelopment. Held multiple roles at the d. C. Housing authority and served in several career positions at hud. Welcome back ms. Todman, good to see it. Sandra thompson was confirmed fhfa in 2022. Prior to leaving that agency she was the Deputy Director division of Housing Mission and goals from 2013 until 2021. Prior to joining she spent 18 years at fd i see where she held a number of senior level positions including director of the division of Risk Management and supervision. Welcome back. Madame acting secretary, welcome. Thank you. Chairperson brown, Ranking Member scott distinguished members of the Senate Banking committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today on how the department of housing and urban development is executing our mission. I went to thank the over 8000 hud employees across the country who are helping us carry out that mission but first let me say the support of this committee is critical to ensuring the American People of access to housing. They can afford communities that are strong and resilient. Thank you for your continued efforts to lead and a legislate on these issues. As you are aware this is my fourth week serving as acting secretary. We are grateful for secretarys extraordinary stewardship on the department in the last years. Her northstar was ensuring we centered our artwork on the people and that star still shines brightly. Under the leadership of President BidenVice President harris, hud has made a storks drag to include outcomes for the people we serve but we have provided historic levels of rental assistance, expanded opportunities for homeownership supported the creation of Affordable Homes to rent and to buy. Supported resilient communities, or to root out housing discrimination and help to people who do not make a lot of money just get a fair shot. And resources are having a dramatic impact on people of every community from big cities and small towns or rural areas and tribal nations. But theres more under construction 2023 than any beyond record. We are working to build even more. Hud helps over 4 million households annually through our rental Assistance Programs. Under this administration have itimplemented a number of histoc changes we serve more families and support more choice in todays market. Hud has provided payments of 120,000 new incremental vouchers and that is a 20 year record. Actions are taken to promote homeownership and wealth building has resulted in a higher rate of firsttime homebuyers that we have seen in the last two decades. Through fha we have supported nearly 1. 8 million homeowners with the purchase mortgages including 1. 5 million firsttime homebuyers. Last year we awarded the first ever package of resources to specifically reach people experiencing homelessness and unsheltered settings and Rural Communities. And it taken charge to protect all people facing housing discrimination. Who provided committees with half a billion dollars so far in multifamily portfolio. And by doing so we are also making much and repairs to units across the country. We have pulled together practitioners, experts and thought leaders who are innovating and executing and researching new solutions weve improved hiring a focus on executing it procurement goals. We have had for clean audits in a row. Im grateful for the work of this committee and the members of congress you have worked to make Resources Available to us we can carry out our very important work. We relook ahead huds mission is c