Here’s everything you need to know about the housing bills in the D.C. Council

It wasn’t but a few years ago that D.C.’s officials couldn’t help but crow about all the housing that was getting built in the city. These days, though, there are far fewer cranes dotting the skyline — and a whole lot less optimism. 

Mayor Muriel Bowser and developers have been sounding an alarm as of late, saying that local and national challenges have made D.C. a less attractive place for new investment. Should those trends continue, both market-rate and affordable housing in the city could be at risk. The D.C. Council, for its part, seems to be listening and has taken up a number of housing-related measures in recent weeks. 

Here’s everything you need to know about the state of D.C.’s market for housing — and what’s being done to address it.

Why is housing now such a big issue in  D.C.?

Well, to be fair, when isn’t housing a big issue in the District? What has changed in recent years, though, is the economic context and how that’s shaping what elected officials are focusing on. 

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, most of D.C.’s housing conversations centered around how to build more of it — and how to ensure that as much of it as possible remains affordable. Back in 2022, Mayor Bowser touted an almost half-billion dollar investment in the city’s Housing Production Trust Fund (the main vehicle for financing affordable housing), and last year she announced that D.C. had reached its five-year goal of building 36,000 new housing units a year early.

The hangover from the pandemic and more recent changes to the local and national economies have since caught up to D.C.’s housing market. In short, many housing developers say it’s simply more expensive to build and manage properties in D.C., causing a financial pinch for those already doing so and dissuading others from even bothering to enter the market or pitch new projects.

The amount of unpaid rent to housing providers — including those who build affordable housing — has been on the rise since the pandemic, so much so that D.C. is now thought to lead the country in unpaid rents. (The average unpaid rent surpasses $2,000, per one affordable housing coalition, higher than in any state.) Critics say it’s because of additional eviction protections put in place during the pandemic and persistent economic challenges for many low-income residents. That, city officials say, has put housing providers at risk of foreclosure, especially on properties housing low- and moderate-income residents. 

At the same time, some progressive advocacy groups say the housing picture remains more complicated than that — especially from the view of some tenants.

They say low-income residents are still facing challenges coping with D.C.’s high rents. According to a study published by the left-leaning D.C. Fiscal Policy Institute in April, nearly half of all renters in the city struggle to pay their rent. Similarly, the United Planning Organization recently reported that evictions in D.C. hit a decade high in 2024, and applications for emergency rental assistance have often overwhelmed available funding — so much so that funds are often fully claimed within days.

What is D.C. doing to address these housing challenges?

Last fall, the D.C. Council responded with emergency legislation to roll back some of the eviction limitations imposed during the height of the pandemic and clarify who can access the Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP). 

And this spring, the council followed with legislation largely making those changes permanent. For example, during and after the pandemic, a pending ERAP application was enough to stall a pending eviction case. Moving forward, judges will be given more discretion in allowing evictions to happen even if someone has applied for ERAP. The bill also tightens up qualifications for ERAP, so that applicants have to prove a true emergency need for rental assistance.

Proponents of the bill — Bowser included — say it will help focus ERAP on people who really need it, while letting the eviction process move a little more swiftly through the courts. (They say evictions can now take more than a year, double what it took pre-pandemic.) Critics say that rental assistance demands reflect real personal and economic challenges, and that making evictions more swift while the ERAP process can be slow will push needy people out of housing.

Bowser has also included a number of housing-related initiatives in her proposed budget for 2026, including measures to limit the types of lawsuits that often delay or derail big development projects, an expansion of her current incentives for owners of office buildings to convert to residential, and a $100 million investment in the Housing Production Trust Fund. (Last year it was just under $80 million.)

Bowser and members of the council have also introduced a raft of bills to address housing. In Bowser’s case, it was the RENTAL Act. Her bill would further streamline the eviction process and timelines, specify that people charged with violent crimes can be more easily evicted, extend the life of the reform board that oversees the D.C. Housing Authority, and expand eligibility for certain housing voucher programs for low-income residents.

Council Chairman Phil Mendelson has his own bill that would change how and when evictions happen, while a measure from Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen would prohibit landlords from separately charging tenants for the cost of utilities in common areas. 

Ward 1 Councilmember Brianne Nadeau also offered up her own housing-related bill addressing TOPA, which Bowser also touches on in her RENTAL Act. At the end of the day, this might be the most controversial issue the council ends up deciding on.

I keep hearing about TOPA. What is it?

Along with rent control, TOPA, the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act, is often seen as one of D.C.’s most significant protections for renters in what can often be a volatile and expensive housing market. (It’s also a relatively novel type of law for U.S. cities.)

Originally passed into law some 35 years ago during a moment when D.C. saw a wave of condo conversions and gentrification, TOPA gives tenants the right to purchase their building (or find someone to do it on their behalf) if the owner wants to sell it. The logic at the time was simple: The best way to prevent renters from being displaced when a new landlord comes along is to allow them to become owners of their own buildings. (If you want the full history of TOPA, read this book.)

And there have been plenty of TOPA success stories (I reported on one a decade ago). According to a 2023 study by the Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development, from 2006 to 2020, some 16,224 affordable housing units were developed or preserved through TOPA out of 37,471 units in 937 sales of multifamily properties. Just this week, tenants in a Van Ness building used their TOPA power to steer the sale of their building to their preferred buyer. (Remember, tenants can assign their purchase rights to someone else.)

Of course, TOPA hasn’t been without controversy or criticism — from both sides of the real-estate spectrum. Advocates for TOPA say that for all its good intentions, it remains a complicated and resource-intensive process that many normal renters can’t effectively navigate. On the other side, property owners and developers say it can be a headache to contend with, slowing sales and scaring away possible investment opportunities.

Some of those concerns have led to reforms to TOPA, most recently in 2018 when the council passed a bill that fully exempts single-family homes from the law — largely because of complaints that tenants living in basement units could hold up or fully derail home sales.

What changes are now being proposed to TOPA?

The two bills — from Bowser and Nadeau — take different approaches to reforming TOPA. 

In Bowser’s case, her proposed changes are more sweeping. Her marquee reform would largely exempt buildings less than 25 years old from TOPA, if at least 51% of the units have average rents that are considered market-rate. In essence, Bowser says that TOPA was never meant to apply to market-rate buildings, so they should be exempted since (in theory) those tenants are less likely to be displaced when sales happen.

Her bill would also allow for an exemption from TOPA for a building that has five or fewer years left on a covenant that mandates that half of the units be set aside for low- and moderate-income residents. This, say city officials, would allow for investment in these affordable properties. Relatedly, Bowser wants to amend TOPA to clarify that it doesn’t apply when buildings are refinanced or the capital structure changes. (That could mean a part owner of a building decides to increase their ownership stake in the property.)

Speaking at a council hearing on the housing bills in late May, Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development Nina Albert said that for as well-intentioned as it once was, TOPA is now making D.C. less attractive for housing investment.

“While the original intent was to prevent displacement and preserve affordable housing, TOPA is now used to negotiate for repairs, new amenities, rent concessions, or cash awards for existing tenants. TOPA currently results in significant delays in routine transactions or financial restructurings and must be modernized. In practice, TOPA can delay sales by up to 420 days, and legal disputes can stall transactions for years,” she said.

Nadeau’s bill is more limited, and targeted at what she says are “common sense updates” to TOPA. Like Bowser’s proposal, Nadeau’s would exempt new buildings from TOPA — but only for their first three years. It would also change some timelines to speed up the TOPA process, mandate that the government make more data on TOPA sales available, crack down on so-called bad actors who “threaten the TOPA process,” create standardized forms for the TOPA process, and certify organizations and developers that can assist tenants during TOPA sales. 

“TOPA remains as important today as it was when it was created 45 years ago,” Nadeau said when she introduced her bill. “But it’s often used as a scapegoat in conversations about housing production. The fact is that we can balance the needs of housing investors and tenants with updates to the law that meet the current moment.”

What are people saying about these housing bills?

While it’s probably easy for housing debates to be seen as a battle between profiteering property owners and helpless tenants, there’s plenty of complexity and nuance in the current housing situation D.C. finds itself in — and what solutions could best address it.

At a council hearing last month, more than a hundred witnesses from all walks of D.C. life testified. Small landlords spoke about being pressed by rising costs but limited in being able to raise rents or sell their properties. Affordable housing providers spoke of the threat that unpaid rents pose to the residential projects they have finished — most of which were financed by D.C. taxpayers. (If those properties go into foreclosure, they say, the affordability covenants could well disappear.) Housing experts pointed out that while some issues D.C. is facing are specific to the city, others — like a nationwide shift towards investing in suburban housing  — are not. Housing advocates continue to say TOPA is important, but also concede that it needs to be refocused and modernized to account for current market conditions.

At the same time, some tenants asked the council to consider the conditions they have been living in and the challenges they face trying to keep a roof over their heads.

“I want to recognize that it is a hard market for everyone. But as hard as it might be right now for some developers to make ends meet, it is even harder for tenants who suffer the consequences and live through bad conditions under bad actors day and night. A developer chooses to go into this business because there is a market. Many times, they can go to the city for help. The city seems like it would rather help developers than the people who live in their buildings,” said Earnest Wilkerson, the president of the Minnesota Commons Tenant Association, which unsuccessfully tried to use TOPA to buy its Ward 7 building — but was later purchased by a now-notorious slumlord who has been sued by D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb.  

So what’s next?

Bowser has been pushing the council to act quickly on her RENTAL Act, and there does seem to be a sense of urgency. At-Large Councilmember Robert White, who chairs the council’s housing committee, told The 51st that he’s looking to get something passed into law before the council departs for its summer recess in mid-August.