Lessons from the 1990s Affordable Housing Preservation
The 1990s were a defining decade for affordable housing preservation in the United States as policymakers took action to prevent a large-scale preservation crisis. Hundreds of thousands of subsidized rental homes created in the 1960s and 1970s were approaching the point when owners could prepay mortgages, terminate affordability restrictions, opt out of affordability commitments and convert to market rate housing. This brief revisits that pivotal era to examine how policymakers, advocates, housing providers, and residents built a preservation system in response to an urgent national threat.
October 19, 2026