Features

Why GSEs Believe the Wind is at Their Back

by Lynn Peisner July 11, 2025

By John Nelson Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are adopting a more pro-business approach when it comes to closing multifamily loans in 2025 than in recent years, when sources say they were more selective. The two government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) combined to produce 33 percent more multifamily loans in first-quarter 2025 compared with first-quarter 2024. “There is definitely a ‘volume on’ mindset at both shops,” says Landon Litty, director of agency sales at BWE. “This is a real positive for borrowers.” For Fannie Mae, the volume of multifamily loans totaled $11.8 …

July 11, 2025

Lenders Are Back in Action for Multifamily Development Deals, Says InterFace Panel

by Lynn Peisner July 1, 2025

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — In its first-quarter report, property management research firm RealPage stated that the “supply wave for multifamily was cresting” as the U.S. apartment sector set a record in terms of units absorbed (138,302), outpacing deliveries (116,092). Those figures are a sharp contrast from the first quarter of 2024 when deliveries (135,652) outstripped absorption (103,826). Will Block, partner and co-founder of Olympus Development Co., said that the flip in the U.S. apartment market’s supply-demand dynamic the past 12 months has made all the difference in terms of lenders’ perception. Editor’s …

July 1, 2025

Affordable Housing California Development Features Finance Western

Specialized Financial Institutions Help Affordable Housing Developers Get Shovels in the Ground

by Lynn Peisner June 25, 2025

By Noni Ramos Across the country, affordable housing is facing intensifying headwinds. From Oakland to Omaha, developers are navigating rising construction costs, protracted approval processes and a funding landscape that rarely aligns with the urgency or complexity of the work. Public subsidies — while essential — are often insufficient to bring projects across the finish line. These conditions are particularly acute in high-cost regions, but they are playing out in communities of every size and type. In the face of these challenges, community development financial institutions (CDFIs) are stepping up. …

June 25, 2025

InterFace-Carolinas-Multifamily_Operators

Conference Coverage Features Leasing & Marketing Operations Southeast

InterFace Conference Coverage: Multifamily Operators Are Utilizing Fee Transparency, Concessions to Woo Renters

by Lynn Peisner June 19, 2025

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The federal government has been cracking down on price gouging in recent months. In May, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) implemented a rule to ban “junk fees” from live event platforms like Ticketmaster, as well as hotels and other short-term lodging. This rule precludes the vendor or property owner/management firm from being able to charge hidden fees on the back end by requiring them to put the total cost upfront, inclusive of all mandatory fees and charges. And in January, the U.S. Justice Department (DOJ), along with …

June 19, 2025

InterFace-Affordable-Housing-Southeast-Design-panel

Affordable Housing Architecture & Design Conference Coverage Features News Southeast

InterFace Conference Coverage: Affordable Housing Architects Push the Limits of Design Amid Rising Costs

by Lynn Peisner June 2, 2025

ATLANTA — The United States is short 6.8 million affordable housing units, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. Developers and owners are driven by a mission to meet this critical shortage. This national problem is fueling the work of architects and designers. Like developers, they, too, have picked up the baton — or the pencil, as the case may be — and applied practices that are custom-tuned to bring much-needed rental housing to market as quickly and efficiently as possible. Editor’s note: InterFace Conference Group, a division of …

June 2, 2025

Affordable Housing Conference Coverage Features Southeast

Affordable Housing Developers Aim to Control What They Can Control, Say InterFace Panelists

by Lynn Peisner May 23, 2025

ATLANTA — Interest rates. Tariffs. Natural disasters. These three factors alone frighten any developer, let alone those who are tasked with delivering our nation’s affordable housing supply. Just to get to the ribbon-cutting ceremony, developers have an uphill climb. They have to obtain the land outright or in a ground lease agreement, navigate the permitting and entitlement processes, overcome any neighborhood pushback, raise equity and borrow the necessary capital and then build these communities on time and on budget. Editor’s note: InterFace Conference Group, a division of France Media Inc., produces …

May 23, 2025

Features From the Magazines Operations Technology

Three Ways the Pandemic Changed Leasing for the Better

by Channing Hamilton May 16, 2025

Looking at the multifamily industry today, it’s easy to forget that many of our current best practices were born of necessity five years ago, when the COVID-19 pandemic introduced phrases like “stay-at-home orders” and “social distancing.” As challenging as those times were, some of the adjustments we made ended up reshaping our business for the better. Nearly every aspect of multifamily has examples of these positive pandemic pivots. Here are the three I consider the most significant in the realm of marketing, leasing and how we interact with prospects. 1. …

May 16, 2025

The investment sales panel at Interface Affordable Housing Southeast

Affordable Housing Conference Coverage Features Georgia Investment Sales Southeast

InterFace Panel: Affordable Housing Investment Sales Face Uncertain Future

by Channing Hamilton May 12, 2025

ATLANTA — Affordable housing is facing a tumultuous second half of the year. Tariffs on building materials such as lumber, steel and aluminum are slowing development activity as they elevate construction costs. Investment sales are also likely to be impacted by unstable economic conditions in the affordable housing sector, where many transactions are conducted within a limited budget due to the nature of income restrictions for renters. Amid high costs and trade uncertainty, many investors are making the decision to stay on the sidelines or invest in markets with more …

May 12, 2025

Features From the Magazines Leasing & Marketing Operations Technology

Will AI Take the Place of Leasing Agents?

by Channing Hamilton May 5, 2025

Members of Generation Z — born between 1997 and 2012 — are all in on artificial intelligence (AI). These young renters are not only fluent and reliant upon intelligent technology, but they are also more trusting of it than their elders. Gen Zers are more likely than other age groups to ask questions via chat or text during their apartment rental search journey, according to RealPage data, and they are even more likely to engage if AI is driving the messaging. In fact, 50 percent of Gen Zers say they are …

May 5, 2025

Affordable Housing Development Features From the Magazines

Affordable Housing Developers Await New Playbook

by Channing Hamilton April 28, 2025

Developers of affordable housing in the United States are flummoxed by the Trump administration’s bull-in-a-china-shop approach to breaking bloated bureaucracies. Like their brethren in the market-rate multifamily sector, affordable housing developers are anticipating potentially higher material costs because of tariffs and generally elevated interest rates. But more specific to the affordable sector, developers remain in the dark as to how the administration’s view on housing policies and programs will impact their ability to build low-income units in the coming months and years. Within two months after assuming office, the Trump …

April 28, 2025

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