The cost of housing is perhaps the most common affordability issue facing low-income households in the United States today. There are 11 million rental households in the U.S. that qualify as extremely low-income; this amounts to a quarter of all renters in the country. And as the latest annual report from the National Low Income Housing Coalition shows, there are not enough affordable options for the majority of these households struggling to access and remain in their homes.
A national affordability crisis for the lowest income households
The Gap 2026 is the latest report from NLIHC that examines the shortage of homes affordable and available to low-income households. For those 11 million extremely low-income households that exist in the United States, there are only 7.2 million affordable homes within their income range. However, these extremely low-income households compete with those with higher incomes for this same pool of homes. NLIHC finds that only 3.8 million rental homes that are both affordable and available for extremely low-income renters are actually occupied by these households. The data do not include homeless individuals, so it is a statistical undercount by hundreds of thousands at minimum.
The remaining extremely low-income households end up paying far more than they can afford, becoming cost-burdened (paying more than 30% of their monthly income toward rent). Three out of four extremely low-income households in the US are severely cost-burdened (paying more than 50% of their income toward rent). The majority of severely-cost burdened renters are in the workforce or seniors. These disparities are worsened along race and ethnicity lines with Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, Latino, and American Indian or Alaska Native (AIAN) households being more than twice as likely as white households to be extremely low-income renters, while Black households are three times as likely. For cost-burdened households, paying the rent means having little to no income left to cover the costs of transportation, childcare, clothing, or other necessities.
Texas fares even worse
Zooming in on Texas, NLIHC finds that the shortage of housing for extremely low-income renters is even worse here than the national average. On average across the United States, just 35 affordable and available rental homes exist for every 100 extremely low-income renter households. In Texas, only 26 homes are affordable and available for every 100 extremely low-income household that needs one. In our largest metropolitan areas, the findings are even worse: San Antonio has only 24 such homes, Austin has 23, Dallas-Fort Worth has 18, and Houston has just 17.
According to the report, Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth hold the unfortunate positions of #3 and #4 on the list of the most severe shortages of affordable housing for extremely low-income households among the 50 largest metros in America. And Texas is in a tie for #4 among all states with the worst, most severe housing shortage for extremely low-income households.
The reason that Texas cities rank so low is due to a lack of investment in low-income housing, tenant protections, and other renter stability measures. The Gap offers that the rents that extremely low-income households can afford are generally too low to be supported by new construction or maintained by existing housing stock. Areas such as Pittsburgh, Boston, and Tulsa, which rank among the higher rated cities for affordable housing, are not meeting extremely low income housing needs through market rate housing construction. Rather these cities are meaningfully deploying and investing in public housing, subsidized housing, and other cost reducing measures that actually work to keep rents low and low-income families housed. To be clear, no state or major metropolitan area has an adequate supply of rental homes affordable and available for extremely low-income renters. But there are cities and states who are taking advantage of solutions to directly increase low-income affordability.
Meanwhile, Texas’ primary approach to offset our housing shortage has been to go all-in on land use deregulation and permitting reform. Texas has a well-known reputation for limited regulation, where developers are encouraged to “build, build, build,” on the grounds that more market-rate housing production, even high end production, will free up older, less desirable units for lower income households, a process known as “filtering.” Although building more housing can help stabilize housing costs generally, The Gap also points out:
“The extent to which the filtering process benefits lower-income renters in a particular time or place, however, is partly influenced by the tightness of the market, changes in demand, and owner behavior. Since 2015, downward filtering rates have slowed significantly and even reversed in some urban areas, with older housing stock becoming more expensive as landlords have incentives to renovate and upgrade older units in increasingly competitive housing markets where supply has lagged behind demand (Spader, 2025; Eggers & Moumen, 2020). Even when downward filtering occurs, relative rents at the bottom of the market that fall too low may incentivize owners to neglect or abandon their properties, ultimately reducing the benefits of filtering for the lowest-income renters.”
In other words, while building more may help stabilize housing costs, it is not a stand-alone solution to helping the lowest income, most cost-burdened households. Ultimately, these building solutions are simply one method among a suite of necessary answers, and alone will not directly increase supply for the households with the greatest need of affordable housing. If you have pneumonia, it may help temporarily and even be advised to lie down when being diagnosed, but it isn’t medicine, and it does not sufficiently address the underlying illness. Low income households need direct direct support, and the housing crisis cannot be solved without it. Texas must prioritize what many other states already have: Stronger public investment in public support for low-income households.
Harmful, counterproductive federal government trends
The current federal administration has taken counterproductive actions that have made it more difficult to keep low-income households in their homes. As The Gap notes:
“HUD has rolled back fair housing regulations and enforcement rather than following its mandate to “affirmatively further fair housing” by challenging discriminatory local zoning laws or tackling source of income discrimination against voucher holders. The agency has also weaponized its existing infrastructure to advance an unsubstantiated narrative of widespread fraud in HUD programs while dismissing or encouraging departures of staff who could improve program operations.”
This is in addition to the Trump administration dramatic staff cuts to HUD’s departments and field offices, including at the Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity which now exists at nearly non-operational levels. HUD is now moving to add burdensome requirements with regard to mixed-status families, pursuing a repeal of the 30 day eviction notice rule for federally subsidized households, and is considering work requirements and time limits for those in HUD subsidized housing.
These measures and red tape are designed to keep people with the lowest incomes from accessing desperately needed housing support, and endanger thousands of families. The awful, but increasingly likely outcome for many is homelessness.
Solutions
Advocates at the federal level have managed to secure some victories in congress. While the Fiscal Year 2026 discretionary budget originally listed dramatic cuts to HUD regarding cuts to vouchers, assistance, and other subsidies, a bipartisan agreement was achieved to keep these vital lifelines for low-income households relatively intact. In this spirit, we must go further and have Congress preserve and expand our affordable housing stock, increase funding for rental assistance, and reform existing housing programs to be more effective at meeting the needs of low-income households.
There are several legislative proposals in Congress currently that would address these goals. The “American Housing and Economic Mobility Act” would invest $445 billion over 10 years in the national Housing Trust Fund. The “Family Stability and Opportunity Vouchers Act” is a bipartisan bill that would provide 250,000 new housing vouchers, along with counseling services to help families with young children move to neighborhoods with strong schools, jobs, and essential resources. The “ROAD to Housing Act” and the “Housing for the 21st Century Act” are two bipartisan bills that would reform programs that support affordable housing by streamlining inspections for and incentivizing landlord participation in the Housing Choice Voucher program, reforming USDA rural programs, and establishing a grants to promote local and tribal housing development. These are just a few examples of the federal legislation that has been proposed to address the affordable housing shortage.
Meanwhile Texas’ state government has failed again and again to put significant resources toward low-income housing programs. To meet the needs of extremely low-income renters, the State of Texas must act to serve these households with policy and funding.
We are in a moment where our state and our entire nation has accurately identified that affordability must be a top policy priority. What extremely low-income renters are facing in Texas is not sustainable; the data shows this. However, other states that span the political spectrum have proven that we can and should be doing better, and we have the tools and ideas that we need to do it. If we wish to live in a Texas where our neighbors are secure and thriving, we have the road map to get there. We just need to get moving.
You can read The Gap 2026 below or at NLIHC.org/gap.
