House Advances Property Tax Exemptions for Affordable Housing

DENVER, CO - The House today passed a bipartisan bill on a vote of 51-9 to expand property tax exemptions for nonprofit housing developers such as community land trusts to build up Colorado’s affordable housing stock.

“With land prices becoming increasingly expensive, it becomes more and more difficult for housing developers to buy land and build housing that is affordable for Coloradans,” said Rep. William Lindstedt, D-Broomfield. “By expanding property tax exemptions for nonprofit affordable housing developers we can make it easier to build homes so our health care workers, teachers, and child care providers can afford to stay in their communities.”

HB23-1184, also sponsored by Representative Lisa Frizell, expands property tax exemptions to include more nonprofit organizations that build and sell affordable housing and increases the Area Median Income to qualify for this housing from 80% to 100%. It also extends the exemption period from five years to 10 years to better reflect the development timeline for larger affordable housing projects. The bill would create a new property tax exemption for land owned by community land trusts and other nonprofit affordable homeownership providers that develop permanently affordable for-sale homes. This exemption only applies to the land and not the home.

The National Low Income Housing Coalition ranked Colorado as the 8th least affordable state in 2022 and stated that the average renter needed to work 2.3 full-time jobs at minimum wage to afford a two-bedroom rental. Data from the American Community Survey demonstrates the racial inequality when it comes to homeownership with 71 percent of non-Hispanic White Coloradans owning their home compared to only 51 percent of Hispanic and 43 percent of Black Coloradans.