U.S. Faith Communities Are Tackling the Housing Crisis

Churches, mosques, and synagogues across the country are trying to develop low-cost housing

The ribbon-cutting ceremony for Harvest Homes with Pastor Michael Eaddy, Mayor Emanuel, NHP Foundation CEO Dick Burns, and various community members. Courtesy of NHP Foundation. Photo: Roosevelt Holloman, Essential Photography.

Fast-growing metropolises such as Chicago, Denver, and Seattle are all feeling the affordable housing crunch. As large property holders, communities of faith are helping to fill the gap at a time when land for affordable housing development comes at a premium in cities across the country.

When Sarah Anderson moved out of her mother’s house and into her first apartment on Chicago’s West Side, she turned to her congregation, the People’s Church of the Harvest, for help. Anderson’s new apartment is one of 36 units that make up Harvest Homes, which was the first new housing development built in the neighborhood in the past 15 years.

Harvest Homes offers two-, three-, and four-bedroom apartments to families with annual household incomes between $22,000 and $60,000. It was developed in a partnership between not-for-profit real estate organization NHP Foundation and the People’s Community Development Association of Chicago, the independent community development arm of the People’s Church.

“I was pastor in a community that had not had new affordable housing, in a sizable quantity, in some time. So there was a great need for it. As a…