APPLETON, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Inflation continues to impact the housing market, including right here in northeast Wisconsin. Appleton is the latest city to make a move targeting the ongoing housing shortage, and looking for ways to reduce barriers to housing production.
“Soaring costs are keeping far too many people from being able to purchase a home in the first place, or to buy a larger home as their needs change,” Appleton Mayor Jake Woodford said.
Woodford said homes have appreciated over 39% since their last revaluation. That’s created the need for up to 18,000 new housing units over the next 10 years. To address increased demand, the city wants to create a housing development policy task force.
“Organizations that know the ins and outs of housing development at all price points who are seeing the impacts of limited supply daily, and those who are fighting to provide affordable housing as part of their mission.”
Among those are the REALTORS Association of Northeast Wisconsin and the Home Builders Association of the Fox Cities.
“Mortgage rates is a huge concern for everyone,” Tom Rooney, Director of Sales and Marketing for Mark Winter Homes said. “In 2020 we’re at just below three percent, right now today it’s over eight.”
The task force will utilize the expertise of people like Rooney.
“Construction costs in the same amount of time have gone up about 70 percent. Development costs have also risen about 40 percent, that has created challenges for developers as they cannot keep up with the market cost for the house.”
It also includes organizations like Fox Cities Chamber of Commerce and Habitat for Humanity. Over the next several months, members of the task force will meet to discuss ways for the city to combat the problem.
“I expect this work will have the added benefit of streamlining processes around development and projects in general, but our focus is on the production of housing at all price points in the city,” Woodford said.
Task force recommendations will be presented to the common council and used as a roadmap for decisions. The establishment of the task force is pending a common council approval of the resources.
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