Committee hears bills to boost incentives for starter homes and fix school-reimbursement gap

Members of the Joint Committee on Community Development and Small Business heard testimony on legislation aimed at increasing state incentives for so-called starter homes and updating related school-reimbursement rules. Attorney Benjamin Fierro, representing the Home Builders and Remodelers Association of Massachusetts, and Nelly Soto, president of the Massachusetts Housing Coalition, urged the committee to advance bills including Senate Bill 176 and its House companion and a technical correction in Senate Bill 177.

Fierro told the committee the bills focus on encouraging production of smaller, single-family “starter” homes for first-time buyers by changing the incentive structure in the Smart Growth Zoning and Housing Production Act (chapter 40R). “All 3 of these bills…goes to the issue of housing and encouraging housing production, especially starter homes, single family homes that young people, first time homebuyers and hopefully first generation buyers could actually afford,” Fierro said. He described a proposal that would double the per-unit incentive paid to municipalities from $3,000 to $6,000 and raise other zoning-payment minimums (for example, moving a stated minimum from $10,000 to…