Housing and Homelessness

Our nation is nearly four million units of housing short of the need, and that supply shortage is the root cause of our affordable housing crisis.

Mike Levin has consistently fought for investments to increase the supply of affordable housing by providing grants to states and localities and offering tax credits to build and rehabilitate housing and convert unused office space into housing.

Mike believes we also need to preserve the housing supply we do have for homeowners in our communities, which is why he supports a significant federal real estate transfer tax on institutional investors and private equity firms that purchase single-family homes from the open market.

He has also supported policies to help working families achieve the dream of homeownership, such as creating a refundable tax credit for first-time homebuyers and creating a home loan program with no down payments or mortgage insurance premiums for first responders and educators.

Mike has made bipartisan progress in addressing local homelessness. He secured $2.25 million in federal funding to help develop the Oceanside Navigation Center, a homeless shelter offering support services and case management to help individuals transition into more stable housing.

As a leader on the House Veterans Affairs Committee, Mike has especially focused on eliminating veteran homelessness. His goal is to help San Diego and Orange Counties to achieve functional zero veteran homelessness, meaning that the number of veterans experiencing homelessness at any time does not exceed the community’s proven record of housing at least that number of veterans in a month.

Mike believes we must take a multi-faceted approach to address the underlying needs of each individual veteran to ultimately end homelessness. He has introduced several pieces of bipartisan legislation to address veteran homelessness that have been signed into law.

Mike is working to ensure veterans are not restricted from accessing affordable housing due to their disability compensation being factored into income eligibility requirements. He is also pushing local public housing authorities and VA to expand the use of project-based housing vouchers in our region to create a dedicated housing stock for homeless veterans. Finally, he supports strategies such as expanding eligibility for VA housing programs, improving coordination, and cutting red tape to improve outcomes.