We’re tackling the housing crisis
Housing
At HR&A, we believe everyone should have access to safe, secure, and affordable homes. As housing costs rise more rapidly than incomes, a growing number of households across the nation are struggling to afford their monthly rent, much less buy a home. And this crisis isn’t just about housing — it impacts the economic development of entire communities. If families can’t afford their homes, they’re less able to contribute to the economy. Often these pressures reinforce existing inequities, with a particularly harmful impact on communities of color. Housing affordability is one of the most pressing challenges facing our cities, and HR&A is committed to working across the public, private, and advocacy sectors to meet the housing needs of each community.
HR&A is supporting program design and implementation for Amazon’s Housing Fund, a $2 billion commitment to preserve existing housing and create inclusive housing developments through below-market loans and grants to developers, public agencies, and organizations. HR&A led negotiation and underwriting efforts for over 9,000 new affordable homes in the Washington DC area and will continue to support Amazon with their additional commitment of $1.4 billion. 
HR&A collaborated with Brookings Metro, Gensler, and Cara Eckholm Studio to develop a comprehensive study on office-to-residential conversions across six U.S. cities for the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). This research provides cities with actionable strategies to address housing shortages, repurpose distressed office markets, and revitalize downtowns through data-driven conversion approaches.
HR&A prepared the Syracuse region to absorb housing demand from Micron's $100 billion chip plant—the largest private investment in New York State history—through comprehensive market analysis across six counties that identified optimal growth areas and recommended strategies ensuring this transformative investment strengthens communities rather than creating displacement.
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Our Focus Areas
When housing supply doesn’t keep up with demand, displacement often follows—affecting residents, small businesses, and entire communities. Residential or commercial displacement, and we help them quantify this difficult-to-measure and often nuanced problem and identify major pressure points. We understand that displacement doesn’t happen in a silo, so we integrate anti-displacement strategies into larger local plans and programs and ensure real estate development and growth benefit current residents. Whether part of a larger real estate initiative or a targeted community effort, our goal is to ensure that growth and investment benefit those who already call an area home.
Reliable, affordable access to broadband, computers, and digital skills programs are foundational for thriving communities and economies. Educational, healthcare, economic development, and other public policy outcomes are too often limited by lack of access, affordability, or adoption of broadband and digital services. We partner with state and local governments, philanthropies, and private sector clients to design, deliver, manage, and evaluate comprehensive broadband infrastructure and digital inclusion programs. From the largest states in the nation to some of our country’s smallest communities and tribes, our clients serve more than 35% of the US population and are making big impact: by 2030 they will have connected hundreds of thousands of households to new broadband infrastructure, saved families thousands of dollars each year, and unlocked better jobs, education, healthcare, and essential services for millions of people. We specialize in aligning public, private, and nonprofit interests to deliver efficient, effective, scalable solutions.
Homelessness and the housing crisis are inextricably linked, and we work with clients in a myriad of ways to address both — by leveraging significant affordable housing finance and real estate expertise to get housing built, engaging with communities that are most impacted by homelessness to create effective programs that improve people’s lives, and helping our clients shape better housing policy. We believe in placing the user experience at the center of permanent supportive housing solutions for our unhoused community members. Our interdisciplinary team has a track record of working inside and outside of local government to advance innovative solutions that promote racial equity and economic justice.
As a national leader in housing fund design, HR&A stands apart with our expansive range of integrated services — from initial capital strategy to fund design to deployment and underwriting. With this full circle understanding, we design innovative funding products for local governments, housing authorities and impact investors and help them evaluate financial risks and identify feasibility to maximize public benefit. Local governments and housing authorities also engage us to select developers to create affordable homes on public land. In the last three years, we have underwritten over 30 loans for affordable housing and over $1B in housing transactions.
To effectively address housing affordability challenges, you need to understand the problem and create a roadmap to solve it. Our housing experts conduct housing needs assessments to assess and quantify how many homes are needed to support communities and local economies. Then, we identify gaps in existing housing programs, policies and funding   and explore options to build a stronger set of housing tools, grounded in local feasibility. We specialize in bringing communities together to set clear priorities and build strategies that are tailored to local needs. Once we’re done, we help our clients tell their housing affordability story and get the word out to support adoption and implementation. Â
Having adequate capacity and the right tools and policies in place is essential to foster housing affordability in any community. We help our clients stand up new housing programs and entities to build a stronger housing ecosystem that is positioned to address local needs and support the development of affordable housing.
We also work with states, counties, and municipalities to assess and design successful housing programs and policies that achieve community goals. We understand what tools — from office to residential conversions, inclusionary zoning ordinances, preservation strategies, and everything in between — will work for local contexts. Working with public and private entities across the country, we help our clients create their own customized toolkits to drive housing solutions in their backyard.
Services
Projects
The City of Stamford, which has grown over 10.5% in the past decade, partnered with HR&A to address its affordable housing needs with the Stamford Housing Affordability Plan, which updated zoning policies and launched a Housing Trust Fund. Recognized for excellence in community engagement by the Connecticut Chapter American Planning Association and as the best among 17 local housing plans by Fairfield County’s Center for Housing Opportunity, the plan aims to create or renovate 1,000 affordable apartments by 2025.
HR&A developed an Affordable Housing Plan for the City of Charlottesville that centers racial equity and regional collaboration to guide the city’s investments in affordable housing programs and policies. Charlottesville has made significant progress on the Plan’s three major initiatives including: dedicating $10M a year to affordable housing, building inclusive governance throughout the City’s housing ecosystem, and adopting progressive, inclusionary zoning reforms — all of which are shaping a denser, more economically diverse Charlottesville. 
HR&A worked with the Maine Governor’s Office of Policy Innovation to develop a study to understand housing needs and deficits along with their impacts on Maine’s economy. Our study found that 76,400–84,300 new homes need to be built within the next 7 years to maintain Maine’s economic growth.
In response to input from residents, affordable housing advocates and developers, the City of New Haven engaged HR&A to develop an inclusionary zoning policy that ensures long-term affordability, inclusive growth, and thriving neighborhoods. Over 50 affordable homes have been approved since the ordinance’s approval in 2022. 
Over 2,000 lower-income Californians have achieved homeownership through a statewide shared appreciation revolving loan fund that HR&A helped design. Our analysis of housing trends across 10 regions and development of lending parameters created a sustainable down payment assistance program addressing affordability barriers.
Recognizing the opportunity the City has to invest in its existing housing stock to preserve affordability, the San Diego Housing Commission (SDHC) engaged HR&A and National Housing Trust (NHT) to create the Affordable Housing Preservation Study — a robust inventory and projections of San Diego’s existing affordable housing and a policy framework designed to preserve affordability.
HR&A supported the City of Boston’s Planning Department (fka the Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA)) in studying the feasibility of converting vacant downtown offices to residences through subsidies, tax incentives, and expedited permitting, which resulted in the City launching an office conversion pilot program. Since its launch in October 2023, the program has received applications proposing nearly 800 new homes, and in 2024 the City extended the pilot with $15 million in new funding from the State.
HR&A developed an interactive dashboard for the Florida Apartment Association to track Florida’s rapidly growing housing needs at the county and metro-area level and showcases cost drivers and benefits of incentive tools to highlight housing gaps for lower-income renters. 
On behalf of Westchester County’s Department of Planning, HR&A Advisors designed and implemented a new $90M fund to allocate the County’s American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds. The Flex Fund is projected to support the development of approximately 1,500 new affordable homes across the county. 
The State of Washington engaged HR&A Advisors to conduct a Needs Assessment for Equitable Energy Assistance to better serve thousands of low-income households that face high energy costs and unhealthy living conditions at home. HR&A presented 15 recommendations and a roadmap to achieve equitable decarbonization by 2050, informed by voices of environmentally burdened communities across the state.
HR&A worked with Los Angeles County to review and update the rent increase formula under its Rent Stabilization and Tenant Protections Ordinance following pandemic-era market disruptions. Our comprehensive analysis and stakeholder engagement produced six policy options, with the Board of Supervisors adopting one of our recommendations in June 2024.
Facing housing affordability pressures, the City of Saint Paul engaged HR&A to develop an anti-displacement and community wealth-building strategy. HR&A provided the City with tools and strategies to mitigate displacement while supporting new development. 
HR&A supported the New Urban Mobility Alliance (NUMO) to leverage the historic influx of federal infrastructure funding as an opportunity to champion a paradigm shift in how communities approach infrastructure investment. As part of this effort, HR&A supported 15 cities to design projects that reconnect communities, led workshops on measuring and mitigating displacement, and developed the Good Start Toolkit, which offers guidance for working with communities on similar efforts across the country.
HR&A collaborated with the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health to design and implement the County’s Mental Health Services Act (MHSA) Housing Program. Within 12 months, the original MHSA funds were committed to 30 projects, and together with $131 million of supplemental funding added during subsequent years, the County deployed a total of $243 million to fund 92 developments with 5,400 units, 1,700 of which were targeted to vulnerable populations. 
The Los Angeles County Department of Consumer and Business Affairs selected HR&A to provide recommendations for a potential Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA) policy for unincorporated areas in LA County, which aims to prevent displacement, preserve affordable housing, and increase homeownership opportunities for renters. HR&A developed a set of preliminary recommendations on program design and implementation strategies, including the required ecosystem, funding support, staffing costs, and data tracking needs.Â
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