Trending news
Mike Scott Authors Op-Ed on How to Increase New Home Construction in the Boston Business Journal
Print PDFMike Scott, co-managing partner of Nutter, wrote an op-ed discussing how Massachusetts faces an intersecting storm of historic and contemporary issues that make it incredibly expensive to build new housing in the Boston Business Journal. In the article, “Commentary: Developers solve for financing, not profit, with dense, multifamily projects,” Mike pointed out that any community that wants to contribute to the long-term economic competitiveness of Massachusetts must consider creative strategies to drive down project cost, lower risk, and support financially viable projects. He noted that tax incremental financing (TIF) and district improvement financing (DIF) can help make a project more likely (especially one that includes affordable housing), and state dollars for infrastructure-related costs can reduce some of the non-housing-specific benefit costs.
“During their first year in office, Gov. Maura Healey and Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll have proven that they ‘get it’ —encouraging communities to lower barriers to multifamily construction, considering how state dollars can support new projects and trying to maximize state owned parcels (addressing the challenge of high land costs) to spur new housing,” Mike wrote. “This type of creativity is necessary for Greater Boston to maintain the engine that drives its economy.”
Mike concluded that with greater understanding of the factors that play into housing costs and the ways municipal regulations drive up those costs, elected officials can begin to tackle the artificial barriers to new home construction.
