ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

An Overview of Federal Support for Housing

Summary and Introduction 

The federal government commits substantial resources 

to support housing and mortgage markets through a 

combination of spending programs and tax expenditures 

(that is, subsidies conveyed through reductions in taxes). 

During the crisis of the past two years, the budgetary 

commitment expanded—to about $300 billion in fiscal 

year 2009—from the placement into conservatorship 

in September 2008 of the Federal National Mortgage 

Association (Fannie Mae) and the Federal Home Loan 

Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac) and the creation 

of new housing programs. This Congressional Budget 

Office (CBO) brief describes, in broad terms, the array of 

federal activities that support housing and the recent 

expansion of particular programs. 

Most of the federal government’s support for housing 

is provided for homeownership (see Figure 1). In 2009, 

the federal government devoted almost four times the 

amount of budgetary resources to supporting homeownership (about $230 billion) as it devoted to improving rental affordability ($60 billion). The government 

supports homeownership by subsidizing the costs of 

owning a home (reducing down payments, mortgage 

insurance costs, and tax liability) and increasing the 

availability of mortgage loans. Until recently, the bulk of 

federal support for homeownership took the form of tax 

expenditures, which make it less expensive to own a 

home by reducing taxes for homeowners and investors. 

As a result of recent actions to address the crisis, the 

government now provides roughly equivalent amounts of 

support for homeownership through tax expenditures 

and spending programs. About 80 percent of the federal 

support for renters is provided by spending programs; the 

remainder is provided through tax expenditures. The 

federal government also shapes the housing and mortgage 

markets through regulation—as provided, for example, 

in the Truth in Lending Act and the Home Mortgage 

Disclosure Act.

This brief categorizes 28 federal housing activities by 

type of support (homeownership or rental), mechanism 

(spending or taxation), and budgetary cost in 2009.1

Because much of the recent assistance is intended to be 

temporary, such costs are expected to decline as market 

conditions improve. Those costs are recorded in the 

federal budget using one of three accounting methods—

cash basis, present-value basis, or present-value basis 

adjusted for market risk (see Box 1). Annual spending 

amounts recorded in the budget can vary considerably 

depending on the method used to estimate them, and for 

some programs, they understate the full economic cost of 

the resources committed.

Goals of Federal Support for Housing

Federal housing policy has long aimed to increase the rate 

of homeownership and, to a lesser extent, make rental 

housing affordable for low-income families. The nation 

has made more progress on the former goal than on the 

latter. Homeownership rates increased steadily throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, peaking in 2004 at just 

under 68 percent of all households (see Figure 2 on 

page 4).2

 However, the proportion of households paying 

more than 30 percent of their income for housing—an 

CBO A series of issue summaries from

the Congressional Budget Office

NOVEMBER 3, 2009

1. Spending amounts are the amount of budget authority provided 

or estimated for 2009, unless otherwise noted. Budget authority is 

authority provided by law to incur financial obligations that will 

result in immediate or future outlays of federal government funds. 

Tax expenditure amounts are from the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT), Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal Years 

2008–2012, JCS-2-08 (2008). This brief excludes programs that 

received budget authority of less than $100 million in 2009. It 

excludes four additional tax expenditures—the deferral of income 

from installment sales, the deferral of gain on like-kind exchanges, 

the new markets tax credit, and the credit for rehabilitation of historic structures—that support the production of homeownership 

units and rental housing. Although JCT estimates those expenditures, the amounts include tax expenditures from transactions 

involving nonhousing assets and are therefore excluded from this 

analysis.

2. Census Bureau, decennial census, long-form housing characteristics; and Census Bureau, Homeownership Rates by Race and 

Ethnicity of Householder: 1994 to 2008, Current Population 

Survey/Housing Vacancy Survey, Table 22. 
2 CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE

ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

Figure 1.

Federal Support for Housing, 2009 

(Billions of dollars)

Sources: Congressional Budget Office (for spending amounts); Joint Committee on Taxation, Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal 

Years 2008–2012 (2008) (for tax expenditure amounts).

Note: The figure shows the sum of the estimates for individual tax expenditures. Those estimates are generally not completely additive 

because each estimate is done in isolation and does not account for likely interactions among expenditures and with other provisions 

of the tax code.

amount that is often categorized as unaffordable in light 

of households’ other needs—increased steadily from 

1997 to 2007.3 The burden of housing’s costs is more 

pronounced among renters than among owners: In 2007, 

45 percent of renters (compared with 30 percent of 

owners) paid more than 30 percent of their income for 

housing.4 In addition, a historically high rate of homeownership overall masks large gaps in rates between white 

and minority households. The homeownership rate was 

72 percent among white households in 2008, compared 

with rates of 49 percent and 47 percent, respectively, for 

Hispanic and black households.5

 Federal housing programs generally aim to address persistent racial and ethnic 

gaps in homeownership and rising gaps between the costs 

of housing and incomes. Most recently, concerns over 

foreclosures, liquidity in the mortgage market, and 

problems in the financial markets have spurred a sharp 

increase in spending by the Department of the Treasury 

and the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).6

Tax Expenditures for Homeownership

Until recently, most federal support for homeownership 

was provided through the tax code in the form of tax 

expenditures. The largest and most widely used tax 

expenditure in the housing area is the mortgage interest 

deduction, which resulted in an estimated revenue loss of

Tax Expenditures for Rental Housing

Spending for Rental Housing

Spending for Homeownership

Tax Expenditures for Homeownership

0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140

3. For a discussion of the origin and use of the standard specifying 

30 percent of income, see Department of Housing and Urban 

Development, Trends in Housing Costs: 1985–2005 and the 

30-Percent-of-Income Standard (June 2008), p. 29, 

www.huduser.org/Publications/pdf/Trends_hsg_costs_85-

2005.pdf.

4. About 28 percent of households paid more than 30 percent of 

their income for housing in 1997, compared with 35 percent of 

households in 2007. See Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University, The State of the Nation’s Housing (2009), Table 

A-5, and The State of the Nation’s Housing (2003), Table A-10.

5. Edward L. Glaeser and Joseph Gyourko, Rethinking Federal 

Housing Policy: How to Make Housing Plentiful and Affordable 

(Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, 2009), p. 16.

6. The Federal Reserve has also engaged in activities aimed at 

ameliorating mortgage market conditions, but those have no 

direct budgetary effect. 
ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

AN OVERVIEW OF FEDERAL SUPPORT FOR HOUSING 3

$80 billion in 2009 (see Figure 3 on page 6).7 That 

deduction typically reduces the income tax that an 

individual owes by an amount equal to the individual’s 

marginal tax rate (the rate on the last dollar of income) 

multiplied by the amount of interest he or she pays on 

loans secured by a primary or second home. The 

deduction for state and local property taxes (resulting in 

a tax expenditure of $16 billion) produces a similar tax 

savings for property taxes paid by an owner on a primary 

or second home. The exclusion for capital gains ($16 billion) allows homeowners to earn a capital gain of up to 

$250,000 ($500,000 for a joint return) on the sale of 

their primary home without paying taxes on that gain, 

and the first-time home buyer credit ($14 billion) lowers 

by up to $8,000 the amount of taxes owed by new home 

buyers who purchase a home between April 2008 and 

December 2009. The exemption for mortgage subsidy 

bonds ($1 billion) allows investors in bonds issued by 

state entities to earn interest on those bonds tax-free, as

Box 1.

Estimation Methods Used in the Federal Budget

The costs of federal housing programs and the government’s other activities are estimated for budget 

purposes using one of three accounting methods—

cash basis, present-value basis, or present-value basis 

adjusted for market risk—based on the nature of the 

program and specifications in law. Those differences 

make it difficult to use budget estimates to compare 

the costs of different programs.

The cash-basis method applies to most transactions 

in the federal budget, including tax expenditures and 

grant programs, such as the Housing Choice Voucher 

program. That method measures all outflows of 

funds for a program in each fiscal year. 

Unlike grant programs, loan and loan guarantee programs—such as those carried out by the Federal 

Housing Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Department of Agriculture, and Ginnie Mae—involve flows or obligations of funds that 

extend over multiple years. For loans and loan guarantees, the Federal Credit Reform Act of 1990 

requires the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and 

the Administration to estimate and record in the 

budget the present value of future cash flows on 

credit extended in a given year. More specifically, the 

budget reflects the government’s expected gains (from 

repayment of principal, fees, and recoveries on 

defaults) minus the outflows (from disbursement of 

principal, payments for defaults, and interest rate 

subsidies). Those flows are converted to their present 

values (discounted) using the interest rates on 

Treasury securities. 

Conventional budget estimates of the costs of loan 

and loan guarantee programs incorporate an estimated default rate. Defaults may fall short of or 

exceed that rate but are likely to be unusually high at 

times of market stress. The compensation for accepting that risk is referred to as the “cost of market risk.” 

When the federal government took control of Fannie 

Mae and Freddie Mac, CBO began estimating the 

costs of the government’s resulting commitments 

by discounting the projected cash flows of those 

government-sponsored enterprises using rates that 

reflect the cost of market risk—just as such costs are 

reflected in the budget for the Troubled Asset Relief 

Program (TARP). (That budgetary treatment was 

specified in the law that created the TARP.) In contrast, the Administration has continued to consider 

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to be nongovernmental 

entities for federal budgeting purposes. Under that 

treatment, the Treasury’s cash infusions to Fannie 

Mae and Freddie Mac are recorded as federal outlays. 

7. Joint Committee on Taxation, Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal Years 2008–2012. As noted by JCT (p. 35), its tax 

expenditure estimates, unlike its revenue estimates, do not take 

into account possible differences in taxpayers’ behavior with 

and without the tax expenditure. Numerous researchers have 

noted that such estimates of tax expenditures might differ from 

the revenue gain to the government if the exclusion was eliminated from the tax code because the estimates do not account for 

taxpayers’ behavioral responses, such as selling taxable assets to pay 

off mortgage debt. See James Poterba and Todd Sinai, “Income 

Tax Provisions Affecting Owner-Occupied Housing: Revenue 

Costs and Incentive Effects” (working paper, University of 

Pennsylvania, July 2008), p. 2. 
4 CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE

ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

Figure 2.

U.S. Homeownership Rates, 

1950 to 2008

(Percent)

Source: Congressional Budget Office based on data from the 

Census Bureau.

long as those entities use the proceeds to purchase 

mortgages of first-time and lower-income home buyers. 

The smallest tax expenditure for homeownership—the 

discharge of mortgage indebtedness ($300 million)—

allows taxpayers to exclude from their income mortgage 

indebtedness on a principal residence that is discharged 

in a debt restructuring or foreclosure during calendar 

years 2007 to 2012.

Spending Programs for 

Homeownership

The federal government also supports homeownership 

through spending programs that increase the ability of 

households to purchase homes or avoid foreclosure. 

Those programs can assist homeowners directly, through 

grants, or indirectly, through programs designed to 

reduce the costs of borrowing. The largest of those programs is the Making Home Affordable program, which 

was created by the Treasury in March 2009 as a temporary response to the housing market crisis. That program 

aims to allow homeowners to refinance or modify their 

loans and move into lower-cost or fixed-rate mortgages. 

The modification program, with $75 billion in committed funds, provides incentive payments to mortgage servicers and homeowners. The Treasury has committed up 

to $50 billion of funds to the program from the Troubled 

Asset Relief Program, and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac 

are expected to spend up to $25 billion to carry out the 

program. CBO expects that the costs of the Making 

Home Affordable program, as well as those for assistance 

provided to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, will decline as 

the housing market recovers.8 (Only a very small portion 

of the $75 billion commitment was spent in 2009.)

The federal government also provides mortgage assistance 

through loan guarantees. The largest providers of guarantees are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. By buying mortgages from banks and other lenders, Fannie Mae and 

Freddie Mac provide liquidity to the mortgage market. 

They create mortgage-backed securities by pooling payment streams from many mortgages combined with guarantees that insulate the purchaser of the securities from 

the risk of default and either hold or sell them. Fannie 

Mae and Freddie Mac were placed in federal conservatorship and have been receiving direct cash infusions from 

the Treasury to help cover the costs of reported losses on 

the guarantees.9

 (Through September 2009, such cash 

infusions have totaled $96 billion.) Now that Fannie Mae 

and Freddie Mac are in conservatorship, the federal 

government effectively is assuming risk on the mortgages 

that they buy and the securities that they guarantee. For 

that reason, CBO now accounts for the entities’ financial 

transactions in its budget projections using an accounting 

treatment similar to that used under credit reform but 

adjusted for market risk. CBO estimates that the subsidy 

costs of new Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac credit activities in 2009 are $43 billion.10

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

0

50

55

60

65

70

75

8. See Congressional Budget Office, The Budget and Economic 

Outlook: An Update (August 2009), Table 1-1.

9. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were created and chartered by 

the federal government (and thus are referred to as governmentsponsored enterprises, or GSEs). They operated for many decades 

as privately owned entities and lacked explicit government 

backing. In 2008, the federal government took control of their 

operations. They are exempt from state and local taxes and most 

regulations.

10. See Congressional Budget Office, The Budget and Economic Outlook: An Update. On the basis of projections of the GSEs’ assets 

and liabilities over the long term, CBO estimated in August 2009 

that the government’s commitments to them would increase the 

federal deficit by nearly $291 billion in 2009. About $248 billion 

of the cost estimated by CBO for 2009 stems from the existing 

assets and liabilities of the GSEs at the time they were placed in 

conservatorship, whereas the remaining $43 billion represents the 

estimated subsidy costs associated with the GSEs’ new business 

after that time.
ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

AN OVERVIEW OF FEDERAL SUPPORT FOR HOUSING 5

The federal government also directly issues, guarantees, 

and insures mortgages and mortgage-backed securities 

through various government agencies.11 The Federal 

Housing Administration (FHA), for example, operates 

one of the largest programs, the Mutual Mortgage Insurance (MMI) program, which aims to extend access to 

homeownership to buyers who lack the savings, credit 

history, or income to qualify for conventional mortgages. 

The program insures mortgages on single- and multifamily homes issued by private lenders, in exchange for a 

fee. If a borrower fails to make a payment or defaults on 

an insured mortgage, the FHA pays the issuer or holder 

of the mortgage the amount due. 

As specified in the Federal Credit Reform Act (FCRA), 

the subsidy estimates for the MMI program reflect the 

estimated present value of all cash flows associated with 

such mortgage insurance (excluding administrative costs), 

without an adjustment for market risk. The FHA estimates that the 2009 subsidy rate for the MMI program is 

slightly negative, meaning that fee collections are estimated to exceed net payments for defaults on a presentvalue basis. (To date, the FHA has never requested an 

appropriation for the program.) In contrast, CBO estimates that insuring more than $300 billion of new mortgages through the MMI program in 2009 will not result 

in savings to the government. Although the FHA has, to 

date, generally estimated that those guarantees will result 

in net savings to the government when they were initially 

made, the net cost of those guarantees is now estimated 

to be positive, as reflected in the sum of annual 

reestimates to the program’s credit subsidies.12 (FCRA 

allows federal agencies to update their initial subsidy 

estimates each year, and they have permanent authority 

to record credit reestimates.) 

Another response to the housing crisis was the creation in 

2008 of the Neighborhood Stabilization program, which 

provided $2 billion in 2009 for the redevelopment and 

sale of vacant, abandoned, or foreclosed properties. Until 

2008, the largest spending program for homeownership 

had been the HOME Investment Partnership program. 

HOME provided about $4 billion in grants to state, 

local, or nonprofit entities in 2009; just under half of 

those funds were used to assist low-to-moderate-income 

households with purchasing or remaining in their homes. 

Three additional programs—Community Development 

Block Grant, USDA rural housing, and Housing for 

People with AIDS—provided smaller amounts ($1 billion or less) in support of homeownership in 2009.

Tax Expenditures for Rental Housing

The federal tax code also supports rental housing but to a 

lesser extent than it supports homeownership. Two of 

those tax expenditures—the low-income housing tax 

credit (LIHTC) and accelerated depreciation—each 

provide about $5 billion to $6 billion in annual support 

(see Figure 4). LIHTCs are allocated to the states on the 

basis of a formula and are then distributed by the states to 

developers on a competitive basis. Private developers generally sell the tax credits and use the proceeds to reduce 

the amount of debt they incur to develop or rehabilitate 

rental housing. In exchange, developers make a portion of 

their rental units available to low-income households at 

rents set by HUD. However, estimates of the size of the 

tax expenditures for rental housing vary considerably 

depending on the tax structure to which the expenditure 

is being compared, making it difficult to rank their 

relative size.13 Two additional tax expenditures—the

exclusion of interest on rental housing bonds and the

foreign housing deduction and exclusion—each provided approximately $1 billion in support of rental housing in 2009. 

11. The Departments of Agriculture (USDA) and Veterans Affairs 

(VA) directly issue and guarantee mortgages; the Government 

National Mortgage Association (Ginnie Mae) guarantees securities 

backed by mortgages insured, guaranteed, or issued by federal 

agencies; and the Federal Housing Administration provides mortgage insurance to private lenders that issue mortgages for singleand multifamily homes. Following the budgetary treatment specified in the Federal Credit Reform Act, CBO estimates that the 

programs run by USDA, VA, and Ginnie Mae resulted in no 

significant costs or savings to the federal government in 2009. 

However, those programs entail market risk similar to the market 

risk associated with mortgage credit provided by Fannie Mae and 

Freddie Mac. Estimates of those programs’ costs would increase if 

the estimates included an adjustment for market risk.

12. Although the original estimates of the MMI program’s total costs 

from 1992 to 2008 are a negative subsidy of $31 billion, the 

Administration has revised those estimates. On the basis of those 

data, CBO estimates the program’s total costs over the period at 

about $3 billion. For the annual reestimate amounts, see Office of 

Management and Budget, “Federal Credit Supplement,” Budget of 

the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2010, Table 8.

13. For example, according to the Office of Management and Budget, 

the largest tax expenditure for rental housing in 2009 was accelerated depreciation, at $10.2 billion. See Office of Management and 

Budget, Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2010: 

Analytical Perspectives, Table 19-1.
6 CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE

ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

Figure 3.

Federal Support for Homeownership, 2009 

(Billions of dollars)

Sources: Congressional Budget Office (for spending amounts); Joint Committee on Taxation, Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal 

Years 2008–2012 (2008) (for tax expenditure amounts).

Notes: The subsidy for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is estimated by CBO on a present-value basis, reflecting an adjustment for market risk. All 

other spending amounts are recorded on a cash basis.

USDA = U.S. Department of Agriculture.

a. A portion of the $25 billion in assistance under this program is included in the subsidy for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in fiscal year 2009. 

The remainder will be provided in 2010.

b. Excludes CBO’s estimate of the credit subsidy cost for guarantees provided by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac prior to 2009.

c. Of the $14 billion estimated expenditure, about $4.5 billion takes the form of outlays for refundable credits.

d. Supports homeownership and rental housing.

Spending Programs for 

Rental Housing 

Federal spending programs for rental housing take two 

forms: payments for households to rent housing in the 

private market and payments to public housing authorities (PHAs) and private developers to build and operate 

rental housing. The largest of those programs is the 

Housing Choice Voucher program, also known as Section 8, which was funded at about $16 billion in 2009. 

The voucher program sets the portion of income that a 

qualifying household pays to a private landlord, with the 

PHA paying the difference between the tenant’s portion 

and a market-rate rent determined by HUD. The secondlargest program, funded at about $11 billion in 2009 and 

also administered by HUD, is the public housing

program.14 That program provides funds for PHAs to 

operate, renovate, and build publicly owned housing 

developments. Finally, HUD also operates the projectbased voucher programs ($9 billion), in which HUD 

agrees to pay the owner of a rental unit the difference 

between 30 percent of the tenant’s income and the rent of 

the unit. 

Housing for People with AIDSd

Discharge of Mortgage Indebtedness

USDA Rural Housing Programs

Exemption for Mortgage Subsidy Bonds

Community Development Block Grant Programd

HOME Investment Partnershipd

Neighborhood Stabilization Program

First-Time Home Buyer Creditc

Exclusion for Capital Gains 

Deductibility of State and Local Property Taxes

Subsidy for Fannie Mae and Freddie Macb

Making Home Affordablea

Mortgage Interest Deduction

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

Spending Program Tax Expenditure

14. That amount includes budget authority for the operating, capital, 

and HOPE VI (Homeownership and Opportunity for People 

Everywhere) funds for public housing. HOPE VI provides funds 

for PHAs to make physical, managerial, or social service improvements to public housing.
ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

AN OVERVIEW OF FEDERAL SUPPORT FOR HOUSING 7

Figure 4.

Federal Support for Rental Housing, 2009 

(Billions of dollars)

Sources: Congressional Budget Office (for spending amounts); Joint Committee on Taxation, Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures for Fiscal 

Years 2008–2012 (2008) (for tax expenditure amounts).

Note: HOPE = Homeownership and Opportunity for People Everywhere; USDA = U.S. Department of Agriculture.

a. Supports homeownership and rental housing.

Eight additional programs provided between $150 million and $3 billion in support of rental housing in 2009 

(see Figure 4). They include, in descending order of support provided, Homeless Assistance Grants, the HOME 

Investment Partnership, Native American Block Grants, 

Rental Assistance Subsidy (assistance for low-income, 

elderly, and disabled renters in rural areas), Housing 

Programs for the Elderly, Housing Programs for the 

Disabled, Community Development Block Grants, and 

Housing for People with AIDS.

In addition, two federal agencies—FHA and USDA—

provide direct loans and guarantees to support rental 

housing. Just as with mortgage-related programs for 

homeownership, loans and guarantees made by those 

agencies in 2009 resulted in no significant costs or savings 

to the government under the method of accounting specified in the Federal Credit Reform Act. 

Housing for People with AIDSa 

Community Development Block Grant Programa

Housing Programs for the Disabled (Section 811)

Housing Programs for the Elderly (Section 202)

Exclusion of Interest on Rental Housing Bonds

Rental Assistance Subsidy (Section 521, USDA)

Foreign Housing Exclusion and Deduction

Native American Block Grants 

HOME Investment Partnershipa

Homeless Assistance Grants

Accelerated Depreciation (Normal tax method)

Low-Income Housing Tax Credit

Project-Based Vouchers

Public Housing (Capital fund, operating fund, HOPE VI)

Housing Choice Vouchers (Section 8)

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18

Spending Program Tax Expenditure
8 CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE

ECONOMIC AND BUDGET ISSUE BRIEF

Regulation of Mortgages and Housing

In addition to spending programs and tax expenditures, 

the federal government shapes the housing market 

through regulation. Federal regulation of mortgages and 

housing generally serves two main purposes: establishing 

the rules for consumers and producers to follow and 

bringing about specific housing outcomes. Regarding the 

former, the Truth in Lending Act and the Real Estate 

Settlement Procedures Act aim to ensure that home buyers have adequate and understandable information about 

the terms of their mortgages. Other laws, such as the 

Home Mortgage Disclosure Act and the Fair Housing Act 

(generally known as antidiscrimination laws), support 

equal access to rental housing and homeownership 

opportunities. Laws aimed at the second purpose—bringing about certain housing outcomes—are intended to 

lower rates of mortgage default (in the case of the Real 

Estate Settlement Procedures Act) or to boost homeownership among low-income households (in the case of 

the Community Reinvestment Act). State and local laws 

also shape the housing market and are widely recognized 

to be influential determinants of the supply of both 

homeownership units and rental housing.

This brief was prepared by Elizabeth Cove Delisle of 

CBO’s Budget Analysis Division. It and other CBO 

publications are available at the agency’s Web site 

(www.cbo.gov), together with a list of sources on federal 

housing activities and additional descriptions of federal 

housing activities.

Douglas W. Elmendorf 

Director