Senate Passes Bipartisan Housing Bill 85-5, Capping Investor Home Purchases

The Senate passed a sweeping housing bill 85-5 on Monday, sending what CBS called the most sweeping housing legislation in decades to the House. CBS News and CNBC reported that the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act is meant to raise the supply of homes and lower costs, partly by limiting how many single-family homes large institutional investors can buy. The House, returning from recess this week, is expected to move quickly, CBS reported.

The vote followed an agreement announced last week between the Senate Banking and House Financial Services committees to reconcile two versions of the bill. The Senate passed an earlier version in March and the House approved its own in May, CBS reported. CNBC said the House version was viewed as friendlier to Wall Street and the Senate’s included tougher limits on investors. The final text keeps a cap on investors who own 350 or more units but drops a provision that would have required them to sell newly built units beyond that cap within seven years, CNBC reported. Lawmakers in both parties had worried the sell-by requirement would discourage new construction.

Beyond the investor limits, the bill contains more than 45 housing provisions, according to Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts Democrat who is the top Democrat on the Banking Committee. CBS and CNBC reported that it would remove regulatory barriers and streamline environmental reviews for affordable housing, update chassis requirements for manufactured housing, create an innovation fund for communities that increase supply, tie Community Development Block Grant funding to housing production and set up a pilot program to turn vacant buildings into homes. The White House pushed for the investor provision, CBS reported, and CNBC said President Donald Trump has signaled support for the bill.

The sponsors framed it as a cost-of-living measure. Sen. Tim Scott, the South Carolina Republican who chairs the Banking Committee, said on the Senate floor that “housing prices are too darn high and housing supply too low.” Warren said the country is closer than ever “to passing the biggest housing bill since 1990,” when the average home sold for about $150,000, compared with more than $500,000 now. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Neil Bradley, quoted by CNBC, said the country faces a shortage of more than 4.7 million homes and that a supply-focused package is “the most effective and sustainable way to improve affordability.”

Both parties see political value in the vote with the midterm elections ahead. When the Senate advanced the bill last week, Senate Majority Leader John Thune called it “just the latest item on Republicans’ agenda to address the cost of living” and said he looked forward to sending it to the president’s desk, CBS reported. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said the bipartisan bill “shows Americans how we should govern,” and added that such opportunities have become few and far between “thanks to the chaos coming out of the White House.” Rep. French Hill of Arkansas, who chairs the House Financial Services Committee, said the final text includes “key House priorities,” including nine community banking bills. Rep. Maxine Waters of California, the committee’s top Democrat, said that “no compromise is perfect” but that the legislation reflects “meaningful progress.”

The bill nearly stalled, CNBC reported, as Republicans debated the provisions limiting institutional investors and the chambers haggled over differing versions. CBS called it a rare bipartisan achievement during an election year after months of gridlock in Congress.