Renters of DC’s Affordable Units Stay Nearly 5 Years Longer Than Class A Renters

• May 26, 2020

by Nena Perry-Brown

DC's Office of the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) has published a report that looks at how residential developments that use Housing Production Trust Fund (HPTF) dollars have affected the tenure of low-income renters in DC.

The report finds that renters of HPTF units, who earn up to 30, 50, or 80% of median family income, were found to have an average tenure of 7.5 years in the city, roughly 2.4 years longer than renters of market-rate Class B and C apartments. When it comes to tenure in a specific apartment, renters of HPTF units stay an average of 4.3 years, while renters of market-rate Class B and C apartments stay for just under three years.

Meanwhile, renters of market-rate Class A apartments had an average tenure in the city of 5.4 years, about 2.4 years shorter than renters of market-rate Class B apartments. As for individual apartments, renters of Class A units had an average tenure of 2.9 years, while renters of market-rate Class B apartments stay in their units for 4.2 years.

The study uses individual income taxes from 2001-2016 to see how many years someone filed taxes from a particular address or as a city resident. For added context, the average gross incomes for renters of Class A, Class B, combined Class B and C, and HPTF units were $75,326, $29,133, $34,618 and $22,978, respectively.

The CFO report comes in light of a Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity study saying that DC has the most severe gentrification and displacement in the country. DC uses the HPTF as the primary means to create affordable housing via gap financing for new construction and renovations. The fund has produced 9,000 affordable units since 2001.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/renters-of-dc-financed-affordable-units-stay-5-years-longer-than-renters-of/16879