# Affordable Housing Initiative

> Independent free-market housing-policy research and commentary. NOT a government site; not affiliated with any government agency. Aggregates and attributes public data (FRED, Congress.gov, news feeds) for commentary.

## Key pages
- [Homepage](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/)
- [Live Housing Data dashboard](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/housing-data.html)
- [Friday Market Recap](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/friday-recap.html)
- [About / AI orientation](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/llm-info/)
- [Methodology — how figures are sourced and verified](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/methodology/)

## Topic hubs
- [Zoning & Land Use](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/topics/zoning-and-land-use/): Zoning decides what may be built, where, and how much of it. In most of the United States the answer is: not much, not here, and not soon. This is the evidence on what that costs.
- [Monetary Policy & Housing](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/topics/monetary-policy-and-housing/): Housing is the most interest-rate-sensitive asset most households will ever own. A decade of near-zero policy rates and $8 trillion of asset purchases did not leave it untouched.
- [Price Controls](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/topics/price-controls/): Price controls are the most-studied intervention in housing economics, and among the most consistent in their findings. This is what fifty years of evidence says.
- [Subsidies & Tax Policy](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/topics/subsidies-and-tax-policy/): The federal government spends heavily to make housing affordable. Most of that money reaches the demand side of a market that cannot expand supply — which is the definition of an inflationary subsidy.
- [Construction Costs](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/topics/construction-costs/): Materials, labor and land are the obvious inputs. The less obvious ones are statutory, and they compound: each is defensible alone, and together they price out the buyer at the margin.
- [Market Data & Indicators](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/topics/market-data-and-indicators/): Most housing commentary argues about a handful of numbers without agreeing on what they measure. This is what the main indicators are, how they are built, and where they mislead.

## Categories
- [Monetary Policy](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/categories/monetary-policy.html): Federal Reserve rates, inflation, quantitative easing & asset price distortion
- [Zoning & Supply](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/categories/zoning-supply.html): Land use restrictions, NIMBYism, density reform & housing supply constraints
- [Rent Control](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/categories/rent-control.html): Price ceilings, shortage effects, empirical data & tenant impact studies
- [Market Data](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/categories/market-data.html): Housing prices, mortgage rates, inventory levels & economic indicators
- [Policy Analysis](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/categories/policy-analysis.html): Government programs, subsidy distortions, FHA, GSE reform & housing regulation

## Recent articles
- [The Two-Sided Housing Squeeze: Zoning Friction and 6% Mortgages in 2026](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/zoning-friction-mortgage-burden-affordability-2026.html)
- [The Conforming-Loan Ratchet: Why Higher Federal Loan Limits Cannot Fix Housing Affordability on Their Own](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/conforming-loan-ratchet-housing-affordability-2026.html)
- [The Payment Shock Pipeline: How Zero-Rate Policy Pulled Housing Demand Forward and Locked Out Today’s Buyers](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/fed-zero-rate-payment-shock-housing.html)
- [Houston's Housing Lesson: What America's Largest Unzoned City Reveals About Supply, Prices, and Central Planning](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/houston-no-zoning-housing-affordability-lesson.html)
- [Frozen in Place: How Historic Preservation Zoning Locks America's Priciest Neighborhoods in Permanent Housing Scarcity](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/historic-preservation-zoning-housing-supply.html)
- [The Moving Tax: How Real Estate Transfer Levies Freeze Housing Supply and Hit Working Families Hardest](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/real-estate-transfer-tax-housing-supply.html)
- [The States That Said No to Local Veto Power: How Zoning Preemption Is Unlocking America's Missing Housing Supply](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/state-zoning-preemption-housing-supply-reform-2026.html)
- [Friday Market Recap — March 28, 2026: Rates Surge to 6.38%, the Spring Market Window Slams Shut](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/friday-recap-march-28-2026.html)
- [The Federal Home Loan Bank System: America's Hidden $1 Trillion Housing Finance Subsidy](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/federal-home-loan-bank-mortgage-subsidy.html)
- [Taxing Land, Not Buildings: Milton Friedman's Radical Fix for America's Housing Crisis](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/land-value-tax-housing-supply-friedman.html)
- [How New Luxury Apartments Create Affordable Housing: The Market Mechanism Regulators Keep Blocking](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/housing-market-filtering-affordable-housing-supply.html)
- [The SALT Subsidy: How Federal Tax Policy Entrenches the States That Have Made Housing Unaffordable](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/salt-deduction-housing-affordability-high-tax-states.html)
- [The Price Inversion: Why New Homes Are Now Cheaper Than Used Ones — and What It Reveals About the Housing Market](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/new-home-cheaper-than-existing-price-inversion-2026.html)
- [$700 Billion in Housing Wealth Just Evaporated — and Buyers Still Can't Afford a Home](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/fed-real-estate-wealth-decline-mortgage-trap-2026.html)
- [Friday Market Recap — March 21, 2026: Fed Holds, Rates Climb to 6.22%, and the Spring Market Stalls](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/friday-recap-march-21-2026.html)
- [The Missing Middle: How America Banned Its Most Efficient Affordable Housing](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/missing-middle-housing-duplex-zoning.html)
- [The ROAD to Housing: Supply-Side Policy Finally Takes Center Stage](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/road-to-housing-act-regulatory-barriers-2026.html)
- [The Invisible Housing Tax: How Government Rate Suppression Created America's Home Insurance Crisis](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/home-insurance-crisis-housing-affordability.html)
- [The Fed's Rate Trap: How Zero-Interest Policy Locked Millions Out of the Housing Market](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/fed-rate-lock-in-housing-supply-crisis.html)
- [The ROAD to Housing Act: What Congress Got Right — and What It Got Wrong](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/road-to-housing-act-supply-analysis.html)
- [The Wall Street Landlord Myth: How Misidentifying the Villain Prolongs the Housing Crisis](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/wall-street-landlord-myth-housing-affordability.html)
- [CEQA at 54: How California's Environmental Law Became the Nation's Most Powerful Anti-Housing Weapon](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/ceqa-housing-supply-litigation-weapon.html)
- [The Housing Inflation Trap: How Shelter CPI's Grip on the Numbers Is Keeping the Fed's Hands Tied](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/shelter-cpi-inflation-housing-affordability-2026.html)
- [Friday Market Recap — March 13, 2026: Rates Rebound, Tariffs Hit, and the Spring Market Faces a Dual Squeeze](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/friday-recap-march-13-2026.html)
- [The Airbnb Scapegoat: Why Short-Term Rental Bans Cannot Fix America's Housing Affordability Crisis](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/short-term-rental-ban-housing-affordability.html)
- [The Zoning Tax: How Land-Use Regulations Silently Add $94,000 to Every New Home](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/zoning-tax-regulatory-housing-costs.html)
- [The Demand Trap: How Down Payment Subsidies Inflate the Housing Prices They Promise to Fight](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/down-payment-assistance-home-price-inflation.html)
- [The Green Code Tax: How Federal Energy Mandates Are Pricing First-Time Buyers Out of New Homes](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/energy-code-mandate-housing-costs.html)
- [The Urban Growth Boundary Trap: How Planning Lines Price Americans Out of Homeownership](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/urban-growth-boundary-housing-costs.html)
- [Built to Cost More: How the Davis-Bacon Wage Mandate Prices Affordable Housing Out of Reach](https://affordablehousinginitiative.org/articles/davis-bacon-act-housing-costs.html)

## Disclaimer
The Affordable Housing Initiative is an independent research and commentary publication. It is not a government website and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by any U.S. government agency, the Federal Reserve System, the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, or the U.S. Congress. We aggregate and display publicly available data for commentary and educational purposes. Economic data is © its respective sources: FRED data courtesy of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis; legislative data from Congress.gov (a work of the U.S. Government, public domain). News headlines link to and are © their original publishers. Display of this data does not imply any endorsement by its sources.