Advancing Sustainability Across the US Affordable Multifamily Housing Stock

An RMI workshop identified three national priorities to decarbonize US affordable housing.

As the US experiences housing shortages and record high housing costs, the need to provide healthy, high-quality, and affordable housing is clear. Much of the existing multifamily affordable housing (MFAH) stock is in desperate need of upgrades. However, making these improvements accessible, affordable, and practical to owners and tenants is challenging. So RMI, with support from the Wells Fargo Foundation, hosted a series of workshops focused on creating clean, healthy, and affordable multifamily housing.

In mid-2024, the final workshop of the series, hosted in Washington, D.C., brought together a range of stakeholders to hear practitioner perspectives, discuss opportunities, and reinforce a shared understanding of actions needed to advance decarbonizing MFAH in the United States. Serving as a culmination of regional events held in high-energy burden markets (including New York City, Minneapolis–Saint Paul, California, and Atlanta), the DC workshop built on regional findings, informing broader discussions on national market challenges and opportunities.

This article distills the top areas of interest that emerged from the DC workshop. Our Multifamily Affordable Housing Toolkit presents a more comprehensive summary of potential solutions discussed during all five workshops.

The first half of the day-long DC workshop convened non-federal stakeholders — including affordable housing developers, state and local government representatives, financiers, and environmental justice groups — to develop solutions around four challenge areas distilled from previous workshops: economic impact and feasibility, project delivery capacity, equitable community benefits and engagement, and technology solutions and innovations. During the second half of the day, federal agency staff from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), the US Department of Energy (DOE), and the White House joined to gather input from stakeholder attendees and participate in discussions around potential action items building on the morning session. The workshop structure allowed stakeholders to align on challenges and proposed solutions before engaging federal agency staff to explore how these solutions could inform national strategies and federal action.

From these conversations, three focus areas surfaced as leading opportunities to facilitate MFAH decarbonization:

1. Data, Data, Data.

• One resounding message from the convening was the need for more high-quality, consistent, and comprehensive data to guide industry practices. Emerging incentive programs, greenhouse gas emissions standards, and new financing and technological solutions are advancing the building decarbonization market, yet there is clear room for improvement in the collection and utilization of data from these evolving initiatives. From various programs and projects, there is an opportunity to collect and share a myriad of data, including technology capabilities and costs, energy performance, resilience impacts of building upgrades, and other non-energy benefits such as indoor air quality.

• Sufficient data access and transparency can inform market levers such as effective program and policy design, financing terms and conditions, insurance prices, and utility allowances that better reflect the value of decarbonization. Quantifying the health and safety benefits of electric building systems and equipment such as heat pumps, improved ventilation, and a well-sealed and insulated building envelope, for example, could attract more engagement and funding support from the healthcare industry, putting a premium on indoor air quality, comfort, and energy savings. Data on improved building resilience and building operations could support reduced insurance prices for high-performance buildings, making building renovations and operations more cost-effective.

• The DC workshop highlighted the need to further engage insurance and risk management stakeholders, public utilities, and a broader set of key federal agency staff in future discussions on collaboration and data sharing, given their access to and management of critical data.

2. Agency Coordination.

• The capacity for constructive and consistent federal coordination remains essential for aligning efforts and meeting stakeholder needs across the MFAH sector. At the federal level, a range of housing-focused initiatives and programs exist within and among agencies that often operate independently. Similarly, interactions between pertinent federal and state agencies could be improved. Even if federal housing priorities shift, considerations for aligning objectives, protocols, and engagement strategies remain relevant and can lead to more consolidated, efficient, and complementary efforts in driving market change.

• Engaging in open dialogue and receiving informal feedback from external stakeholder groups strengthens federal agency decision-making and outcomes. Future convenings led by neutral facilitators and sustained engagement between federal agencies and stakeholders directly interacting with and impacted by federal programs could foster collaborative problem-solving. Representative state organizations, such as the National Governors Association or the National Association of State Energy Officials, can play a role in strengthening feedback channels by aggregating and organizing stakeholder input around market challenges and federal initiatives.

• As components of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) roll out through federal agencies including HUD, DOE, and the US Environmental Protection Agency, agencies have opportunities to aggregate practical input and learnings through standing and targeted requests for information or “suggestion box”–style feedback channels. For example, building owners might highlight a dearth of options for electrifying hot water systems in multifamily buildings. This feedback could prompt program requirements to incorporate flexibility for certain projects or inform R&D activity to advance relevant technological innovations.

3. Local Implementation Capacity and Training.

• While many federal and state initiatives are driving forward and incentivizing building decarbonization efforts, significant capacity support and training at the local level is still needed among those on the frontlines of navigating new programs, policies, and technical interventions (including facility managers, project teams, design and construction workers, tenants, developers, local municipalities, and community-based organizations). To create durable change, building decarbonization should be integrated into existing practices and planning, including capital planning cycles, building assessments, and permitting. This is a muscle that needs to be strengthened with direct technical support, training programs, planning tools, and sustained funding.

• Funding from larger municipalities, philanthropy, or the private sector — entities that may provide more flexible funding or that are closely connected to local networks — could better empower local groups in their critical role of advancing equitable building decarbonization within their communities. Smaller local building owners, for example, often have fewer staff, budget, and resources than their larger counterparts, making it harder for them to access initial funding and fully benefit from building energy upgrades and investments. Local support such as developer or property management trainings, funding for predevelopment activities, and educational resources and planning tools, can help ensure that decarbonization initiatives are inclusive and drive equitable outcomes.

• Supporting local capacity can also amplify the impact of direct project funding, fostering a lasting ecosystem for continuing work and scalable solutions, rather than one-off projects.

These takeaways capture only a portion of the rich ideas discussed in this workshop. The challenges to decarbonizing MFAH are complex, and the solutions are equally multifaceted, requiring engagement and sustained commitment from a wide array of industry stakeholders and supporting entities. Local and state agencies and housing stakeholders have played a vital role in driving tangible progress on decarbonizing and modernizing MFAH across the country — and they will continue to do so in 2025 and beyond.

We encourage stakeholders to build upon the lessons learned and relationships developed during our workshops, take steps to re-examine and leverage available resources, and coordinate existing initiatives to foster growth. Where helpful, supportive players — including RMI — can help coordinate this collaboration and knowledge-sharing among state and local stakeholders to spur greater action in the market and help secure an equitable and sustainable future for all.

We invite you to explore the online Multifamily Affordable Housing Decarbonization Toolkit for the full set of findings from the series of workshops.

RMI would like to thank Wells Fargo Foundation, whose generous philanthropic support and engagement enabled RMI to facilitate this workshop.