Seattle's 13.1% increase in home prices has led the nation for20 months in a row, just ahead of Las Vegas and San Francisco. Oneof the unfortunate results of record price increases in boomingmetropolitan areas is the lack of affordable “workforce” housingfor individuals. Seattle and our region provide vividexamples of the affordability gap playing out across thecounty—while wages for workers in Washington State in 2017 grew attheir fastest rate since 2007 (5%), statewide increase in homeprices more than doubled that amount.

There are significant short and long-term social costs whenpeople cannot afford to rent (or purchase) housing in thecommunities where they work. A recent report from a Harvard housingresearch group succinctly addressed the consequences of aninadequate supply of affordable housing: Good-quality, safe, andaffordable housing is fundamental to personal well-being andsecurity. But for millions of US families and individuals, payingtoday's high housing costs means sacrificing on food, healthcare,savings, and other essential expenses. Worse still, thesecost-burdened households are increasingly concentrated inhigh-poverty neighborhoods, which further undermine their health,safety, and access to economic opportunity.

There have been a number of initiatives over the years toattract private investment in affordable housing. Examples includethe federal low income housing tax credit program; the new“opportunity zone” initiative which gives favorable capital gainstax treatment to investors in federally designated disadvantagedareas, some of which contain underutilized housing stock ripe forredevelopment; and the Community Reinvestment Act incentivesdiscussed in this article.