Subcommittee hearing pins U.S. housing shortfall on zoning, regulatory delay, labor and materials costs

The Subcommittee on Housing and Insurance of the House Financial Services Committee convened a hearing titled “Building Our Future, Increasing Housing Supply in America” to examine why the nation has not built enough homes to meet demand.

Chairman Flood opened the hearing by saying the central problem is supply, not wages or savings, and that “we are not building enough homes in this country to meet the demand,” citing published estimates of a national shortfall ranging from about 3,850,000 to more than 5,000,000 units. He added that the committee would examine local regulatory barriers, materials and labor costs, and financing frictions. "I am excited to dig deeper into each of these issues today and I look forward to our witnesses' testimony," Flood said.

The hearing assembled legal, policy and local-government witnesses who emphasized overlapping causes and proposed federal roles that do not necessarily displace state and local authority. Ranking Member Cleaver urged bipartisan work on “common sense solutions” and backed bills under consideration, including the chairman’s Identifying Regulatory Barriers to Housing Supply Act and…