User:Lin.jaide/Affordable housing by country

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Italics: Content from the original article "Affordable housing by country"

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''Affordable housing is housing which is deemed affordable to those with a median household income as rated by the national government or a local government by a recognized housing affordability index. The challenges of promoting affordable housing varies by location.''

Paraphrase to: Affordable housing is housing which is deemed affordable to individuals and families below the median household income as determined by a federal or state government, and confirmed by a recognized housing affordability index. According to the U.S. Housing and Urban Development definition, subsidized housing refers to units in which the tenant pays no more than 30% of their monthly income to rent, while affordable housing refers to rentals offered below market rate. The challenges of ensuring affordable housing to communities varies by location, with factors including social stratification, urbanization, transportation and infrastructure, and wealth inequality.

Mali
''Development Workshop, a Canadian and French NGO, has brought a real alternative to the inhabitants to accede to affordable housing that fights the environmental degradation and offers training and employment for many people who were under-employed or unemployed. The project has received many awards, such as the UN-Habitat-United Nations Human Settlements Programme award. One of the key aspects of the project is the introduction of a woodless construction and new techniques to build public buildings, offices, and simple shelters among other examples. This process increases the demand for skilled builders, and as a consequence training courses became necessary. The economic cost of the building decreases, and as a result over 1,000 woodless buildings had been built. ''

India
''In India, it is estimated that in 2009–10, approximately 32% of the population was living below the poverty line and there is huge demand for affordable housing. The deficit in Urban housing is estimated at 18 million units most of which are amongst the economically weaker sections of the society. Some developers are developing low cost and affordable housing for this population. The Government of India has taken up various initiatives for developing properties in low cost and affordable segment. They have also looked at PPP model for development of these properties.''

''The Government of Haryana launched its affordable housing policy in 2013. This policy is intended to encourage the planning and completion of "Group Housing Projects" wherein apartments of pre-defined size are made available at pre-defined rates within a time-frame as prescribed under the present policy to ensure increased supply of Affordable Housing in the urban areas of Haryana. One can get Complete list of Projects here. ''

Indonesia
Government-subsidized affordable homes in Indonesia are called Rumah Subsidi and affordable apartments are called Rusunawa. The Indonesian Ministry of Housing announced its commitment to increasing the accessibility of long-term housing and refining the housing finance system, as well as incorporating more local government and stakeholder involvement in housing and settlement development. This policy focus is also shown in the government's implementation of several low-income housing assistance schemes, including the 2003 National Movement for One Million Houses. The movement aimed to improve coordination and collaboration between local stakeholders in housing development and "improvements to the living environment," while also working to develop a housing market empowerment strategy that standardizes housing construction guidelines and public sector housing governance.

United States
**The need for affordable housing has intensified since ??**

''In the U.S., households are commonly defined in terms of the amount of realized income they earn relative to the Area Median Income or AMI. Localized AMI figures are calculated annually based on a survey of comparably sized households within geographic ranges known as metropolitan statistical areas, as defined by the US Office of Management and Budget. For U.S. housing subsidies, households are categorized by federal law as follows:''
 * Moderate income households earn between 80% and 120% of AMI.
 * Low income households earn between 50% and 80% of AMI.
 * Very low income households earn no more than 50% of AMI.

''Some states and cities in the United States operate a variety of affordable housing programs, including supportive housing programs, transitional housing programs and rent subsidies as part of public assistance programs. Local and state governments can adapt these income limits when administering local affordable housing programs; however, U.S. federal programs must adhere to the definitions above. For the Section 8 voucher program, the maximum household contribution to rent can be as high as 40% gross income.''

''Comprehensive data for the most affordable and least affordable places in the U.S. is published each year by an affordable housing non-profit organization, the National Low Income Housing Coalition. The NLIHC promotes a guideline of 30% of household income as the upper limit of affordability. According to a 2012 National Low Income Housing Coalition report, in every community across the United States "rents are unaffordable to full-time working people."''

However, by using an indicator, such as the Median Multiple indicator which rates affordability of housing by dividing the median house price by gross [before tax] annual median household income), without considering the extreme disparities between the incomes of high-net-worth individual (HNWI) and those in the lower quintiles, a distorted picture of real affordability is created. Using this indicator—which rates housing affordability on a scale of 0 to 5, with categories 3 and under affordable—in 2012, the United States overall market was considered 3 (affordable).

Since 1996, while incomes in the upper quintile increased, incomes in the lower quintile households decreased creating negative outcomes in housing affordability.

''Before the real estate bubble of 2007, the median household paid $658 per month in total housing costs (Census 2002). A total of 20% of households were deemed to be living in unaffordable housing: Nine percent of all households are renters in unaffordable housing, and eleven percent of all households are homeowners with high housing costs.''

''In the 2000 U.S. Census, the median homeowner with a mortgage (70% of homeowners and 48% of census respondents) spent $1,088 each month, or 21.7% of household income, on housing costs. The median homeowner without a mortgage (30% of all homeowners (80% of elderly homeowners) and 20% of respondents) spent $295 per month, or 10.5% of household income, on housing costs. Renters in 2001 (32% of respondents) spent $633 each month, or 29% of household income, on housing costs.''

Federal Subsidies and Other Forms of Government Housing Assistance
''The federal government in the U.S. provides subsidies to make housing more affordable. Financial assistance is provided for homeowners through the mortgage interest tax deduction and for lower income households through housing subsidy programs. In the 1970s the federal government spent similar amounts on tax reductions for homeowners as it did on subsidies for low-income housing. However, by 2005, tax reductions had risen to $120 billion per year, representing nearly 80 percent of all federal housing assistance. The Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform for President Bush proposed reducing the home mortgage interest deduction in a 2005 report.''

Housing assistance from the federal government for lower income households can be divided into three parts:


 * "Tenant based" subsidies given to an individual household, known as the Section 8 program
 * "Project based" subsidies given to the owner of housing units that must be rented to lower income households at affordable rates, and
 * Public Housing, which is usually owned and operated by the government. (Some public housing projects are managed by subcontracted private agencies.)

“Project based" subsidies are also known by their section of the U.S. Housing Act or the Housing Act of 1949, and include Section 8, Section 236, Section 221(d)(3), Section 202 for elderly households, Section 515 for rural renters, Section 514/516 for farmworkers and Section 811 for people with disabilities. There are also housing subsidies through the Section 8 program that are project based. The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and USDA Rural Development administer these programs. HUD and USDA Rural Development programs have ceased to produce large numbers of units since the 1980s. Since 1986, the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program has been the primary federal program to produce affordable units; however, the housing produced in this program is less affordable than the former HUD programs.

''Governmental and quasi-governmental agencies that contribute to the work of ensuring the existence of a steady supply of affordable housing in the United States are the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), USDA Rural Development, the Federal Home Loan Bank, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac. Housing Partnership Network is an umbrella organization of 100+ housing and community development nonprofits. Important private sector institutions worth consulting are the National Association of Home Builders, the National Affordable Housing Management Association (NAHMA), the Council for Affordable and Rural Housing (CARH) and the National Association of Realtors. Valuable research institutions with staff dedicated to the analysis of "affordable housing" includes: The Center for Housing Policy, Brookings Institution, the Urban Institute and the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University and the Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy at New York University, and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Several of these institutions (the Fannie Mae Foundation, Urban Institute, Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program, Enterprise Community Partners, LISC, the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies, and others) partnered to create KnowledgePlex, an online information resource devoted to affordable housing and community development issues.''

Inclusionary Housing Development Regulations
Another program is Inclusionary Housing—an ordinance that requires housing developers to reserve a percentage between 10-30% of housing units from new or rehabilitated projects to be rented or sold at a below market rate for low and moderate-income households.

''One of the most unusual US public housing initiatives was the development of subsidized middle-class housing during the late New Deal (1940–42) under the auspices of the Mutual Ownership Defense Housing Division of the Federal Works Agency under the direction of Colonel Lawrence Westbrook. These eight projects were purchased by the residents after the Second World War and as of 2009 seven of the projects continue to operate as mutual housing corporations owned by their residents. These projects are among the very few definitive success stories in the history of the US public housing effort.''

Adding to "Historical Evolution of Housing Affordability and Advocacy" section:
Central to public discourse on housing affordability is the conversation surrounding advocacy for unhoused and homeless individuals. The evolution of homelessness within the U.S. has been characterized by significant changes not only in perceived solutions, but also in the gradual politicization of statewide provisioning for unhoused and displaced persons. Homelessness first emerged as a national issue in the early 1870s, although the term originally referred to “itinerant “tramps” traversing the country in search of work,” attributing the solution to homelessness as one of employment and job provision rather than affordable and accessible housing. Considering how expectations of home and domestic life remained deeply rooted in American culture throughout history homelessness was even regarded as an “emerging moral crisis that threatened long-held ideas of home life” by a large part of society.

The advent of “muckraking” journalism, led by reform-focused journalists in the Progressive Era hoping to expose corruption and “the realities of the American people” to the public, helped shed a new light on the issue of homelessness and displacement. Particularly notable is the work of Danish photojournalist Jacob Riis, most known for his series “How the Other Half Lives,” Riis’s work revealed more of the deplorable living conditions of those occupying slums and tenements, drawing more public attention towards the issue of homelessness. This helped to usher in the “Modern Era” of the housing movement, as advocates and civil rights activists attempted to address the low supply of affordable housing, a worsening recession, and continued gentrification of inner city spaces.

Adding a new sub-section "San Francisco Bay Area":
Affordable housing and Homelessness in the San Francisco Bay Area represents an ongoing part of public discourse, especially as the Bay Area population has increased to house about 20% of the State of California's population — the regional population is expected to increase from 7.2 million to 9.3 million by 2040. Major cities including Los Angeles and San Francisco frequently cite increases to the homeless population as a result of reductions in housing supply, while the limitations to affordable housing are also exacerbated by issues of gentrification and redlining, growing residential sprawl within residential communities, and the prevalence of the housing bubble that keeps rent prices consistently high. While local governance bodies such as the Zoning Adjustment Board (ZAB) have worked to introduce reforms to policies such as single-family zoning in efforts to improve housing affordability, the growing homeless population within the Bay Area also points to shortfalls in addressing the intersection of homelessness with issues of mental illness, anti-homeless sentiments and racial discrimination.

The homelessness experience for individuals simultaneously coping with severe mental illnesses is often intrinsically tied to the extended “institutional circuit” intended to function as a solution to residential instability. In a 1995 research study that interviewed applicants for a homeless shelter judged to be severely mentally ill in Westchester County, New York, researchers found that shelters functioned as “part of a more extended institutional circuit, as a temporary source of transitional housing, as a surrogate for exhausted support from kin, and as a haphazard resource in essentially nomadic lives.” This perpetuation of short-term countermeasures to homelessness, all while de-prioritizing long-term options for stable and appropriate housing, raises the issue of whether shelters and existing institutional models are fully addressing the needs of mentally ill clients who have been displaced or houseless.

With the existing reliance on community shelters to accommodate mentally ill clients, the reinforcement of housing as a public need is also coupled by the de-institutionalization of mental illnesses previously addressed in custody and asylum. The rise of the civil rights movement led to more public demands for severely mentally ill patients to be removed from the “deplorable environments” perpetuated by mental hospitals, asylums, and the like. Legal restrictions on institutionalization have pointed towards placing the responsibility of care on a largely decentralized mental care system.