Bill To Boost Housing, Cut Zoning Red Tape Clears House Committee

A key committee in the House of Representatives approved its version of the Senate’s Road to Housing Act a week after provisions of the legislation were stripped out of a defense bill.

The legislation comes after the House of Representatives stripped housing reform from a defense bill.

The House Financial Services Committee approved the Housing for the 21st Century Act, its version of the legislation passed by the Senate in October. Both bills include zoning reform, efforts to reduce red tape for some infill construction and measures to cut construction costs. 

The National Association of Homebuilders, an industry group helping advance the legislation, aims to get the housing reform package passed in both houses early next year. 

Senators pushed through their version of the bill by attaching it to the National Defense Authorization Act, the $925B bill funding the U.S. military that is considered a must-pass on Capitol Hill. But the housing language was stripped out of the defense bill in the House of Representatives before it passed.

After the provisions were removed, House Financial Services Committee Chairman French Hill, an Arkansas Republican, said members of his party in the chamber would take up the issue in 2026.

The Housing for the 21st Century Act was introduced to the chamber by Democrats Maxine Waters of California and Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri. 

The House bill that cleared the committee in a bipartisan vote this week includes reforms that would eliminate a review process under the National Environmental Policy Act that the NAHB described as time-consuming and duplicative. 

It would also adjust how an index of construction costs is calculated to better reflect actual pricing and reform the HOMEInvestment Partnerships Program, a federal block grant, to allow builders to source material from any vendor to help reduce construction costs. 

The bill will go through an amendment process before it could be scheduled for a vote by the full House. 

The Senate bill was introduced in July by Republican Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina and Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. The core of that bill is a framework for developing zoning and land-use policies to reduce barriers to housing development. 

The bill suggests eliminating parking minimums, allowing duplexes and triplexes by right, reducing lot size requirements and maximizing floor area ratios. It also includes provisions to reform housing counseling programs and increase reporting requirements for local housing agencies that receive federal grants.

President Donald Trump’s administration is looking for ways to combat the high and rising cost of housing while simultaneously pushing for wholesale reforms of federal housing aid. 

In a biennial report released this month, the Department of Housing and Urban Development said immigration was to blame for most of the rising cost of housing. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told The Washington Examiner in September that the White House was considering declaring a national housing emergency.