Research

The California Housing Partnership conducts timely, data-driven applied research to support the preservation and expansion of affordable housing across California. The Partnership’s Research team works closely with various partners to track housing needs as well as resources at the state, regional and local levels, and informs policy and regulations through a variety of online data tools, publications, and custom research services.

Our Insights

Impactful, data-driven
applied research

Housing Needs & Trends

We publish annual Housing Needs Reports for all 58 counties and the California Affordable Housing Needs Report, and provide municipalities with tailored  in-depth regional analysis on affordability gaps, cost burdens, overcrowding, homelessness, and more. Also, we created an interactive tool, the Housing Needs Dashboard, that provides an easy to use tool for people to explore cost burden, rental costs, production of affordable housing, and financing for affordable housing by county, region, and the state.

Preservation Risk Assesments

Through our Affordable Homes At Risk Reports and comprehensive property inventories, we identify subsidized and unsubsidized homes at risk of losing affordability.

Fair Housing & Displacement

We analyze displacement patterns and support efforts to Affirmatively Further Fair Housing (AFFH) by identifying opportunities and challenges in high-resource neighborhoods.

Policy Impact Analysis

We evaluate programs like the Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC) and Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC), measuring social, economic, and environmental impacts. For example, we created the Affordable Housing Map & Benefits Calculator to examine the social, economic, and health outcome benefits of affordable housing for communities across the state.

Development Cost & Finance Analysis

We assess costs of affordable housing development and advise on financing and policy strategies to expand access and preserve affordability.

Explore our housing reports, interactive tools, and full research library to learn more. Have a question or want to collaborate? Please reach out via our Contact Us form.

Data Tools

The Partnership’s data tools are available for your free use.

Please review our Terms of Use for proper attribution, and visit our How to Use page for ideas of sample use cases.

Affordable Housing Map & Benefits Calculator

  • Display property-level information on California’s inventory of subsidized affordable housing developments statewide.

  • Overlay federal and state maps, including CalEnviroScreen and TCAC/HCD’s Opportunity Map

  • View state, county, city and legislative district boundaries.

  • See quantitative estimates of the social, economic and environmental benefits affordable housing brings to individual residents and families, taxpayers, and the local economy.

  • [NEW!] Calculate estimates of these benefits as generated by future housing developments.

  • Export reports on affordable housing’s impact in a given county, city or legislative district.

Housing Needs Dashboard

  • Discover and compare affordable housing need in every county of California.

  • Observe indicators of counties’ housing market conditions.

  • Track federal and state funding levels for affordable housing.

  • View historic and current trends in LIHTC multifamily housing production and preservation.