As the challenge of housing supply grows, these playbooks provide valuable roadmaps for leaders hoping to make tangible progress in their communities.
Source: Housing and Urban Development
Images: Courtesy
Land-use and other regulatory barriers suppress housing production and significantly raise housing costs, research has shown. At the National Housing Supply Summit, held March 18, 2026, in Washington, D.C., one panel, “Tackling the Bottlenecks of Zoning, Permitting, & Codes: State & Local Playbooks for Action,” presented in-depth guides, including policy recommendations and case studies, that can help policymakers identify and implement specific solutions to increase the supply of housing in their communities. Panelists included Colin Higgins, executive director of the National Housing Crisis Task Force; Amy Tomasso, vice president of policy and partnerships at Ivory Innovations; Tobias Peter, senior fellow and codirector of the Housing Center at the American Enterprise Institute; and Asa Fleming, vice president of advocacy at the National Association of REALTORS®. Emily Hamilton, senior research fellow and director of the Urbanity Project at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, moderated the discussion.
Policies to Increase Housing Supply
Hamilton framed the issue in clear terms: a broad consensus exists that the nation faces a shortage of millions of homes, and this problem is due in part to policies that impede new housing construction. Although most experts agree on the root problem, debate continues over the most appropriate policy solutions. The panelists offered solutions in the form of both specific policies and overall strategies. Although Peter cautioned against top-down, one-size-fits-all solutions, he argued that if just three policies were adopted in jurisdictions nationwide, they could add 1.5 million new homes annually to the nation’s housing stock. The first policy would be to allow smaller lots and new subdivisions. Peter cited Dilworth, Minnesota, where a stretch of road has 6 single-family detached homes on one side, valued at approximately $350,000 each, and 10 duplex homes with shared walls on the other side, valued at approximately $250,000 each. Higgins likewise advocated for allowing communities to build more types of homes in more places.
The second policy Peter shared is to allow owners to convert older single-family homes into townhomes or multiplexes. This solution is especially relevant in areas where the availability of land is limited. The third policy would be to allow residential development in commercial or light industrial zones that are close to available jobs. The city of Anaheim, California, replaced a poorly performing commercial district with residential buildings consisting of low-rise apartment buildings and townhomes. The full toolkit from the American Enterprise Institute, “Strong Foundations: A Playbook for Housing and Economic Growth,” offers housing recommendations for more than 6,000 jurisdictions in the United States.
The panelists agreed that policymakers need to be focused on the goal of increasing housing supply. Generally, the private sector builds more housing in areas where zoning allows more housing construction. If the goal of policy reform is to change regulations that impede the market’s ability to produce housing, Tomasso said, then policymakers must consider how their choices affect the ability of development projects to pencil out. To make housing projects more feasible, Peter advocated by-right zoning changes and described how, in Seattle, overlaying an inclusionary zoning requirement on top of zoning changes led to an 80 percent decrease in townhome permitting, erasing the bulk of gains that zoning reform achieved.
The panelists also discussed how improving process streamlining and reform could help increase housing supply. Tomasso cited Salt Lake City as an example of a place where hurdles in the approvals process were stifling existing progress on zoning reform and lot size requirements. Fleming noted that adopting preapproved plans and pattern books that bypass the review process could be an alternate pathway to streamline permitting. Higgins advocated reducing the added costs of permitting, mandates such as parking, and other barriers. The full menu of recommendations from the National Housing Crisis Task Force, which examines land use, financing, governance, construction technology, and regulation and includes several case studies, is available in the organization’s “State and Local Housing Action Plan.”
Considering Human Factors
Fleming presented the “Housing Supply Accelerator Playbook” from the National Association of REALTORS®. Developed by a coalition of partners representing the full spectrum of the housing ecosystem, from policymakers to builders and sellers, the playbook demonstrates the many interests that housing policy intersects and that reformers should consider. Because the housing industry encompasses numerous stakeholders, the panelists noted that leadership can be a crucial component to success. Higgins said that civic leaders play an especially vital role in convening stakeholders with a mandate to make progress on the difficult challenge of land-use reform. Tomasso echoed the sentiment, citing the example of leadership from the city council of Austin, Texas, in streamlining the development approval process.
Leaders and policymakers can, in turn, benefit from supportive policies, including technical assistance, to help implement these changes. Ivory Innovations, Tomasso noted, is assembling a municipal innovation training cohort this summer to work with cities on implementation; in Vermont, a bylaw modernization grant program is helping the state’s rural communities, which may lack capacity, achieve zoning reform. The Ivory Innovations playbook, “The Little Book of Low-Cost, High-Impact Housing Solutions,” details six approaches that civic leaders and policymakers can consider. Higgins said that aligning policies and incentives to foster coalitions of stakeholders can help individual projects succeed and build momentum that sustains new development over the long term.
The panelists reviewed a range of policies and strategies for their success that policymakers at all levels of government can consider. As the challenge of housing supply grows, these playbooks provide valuable roadmaps for leaders hoping to make tangible progress in their communities.
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