logo
Massachusetts needs more affordable housing, study says. Lots of it.

Massachusetts needs more affordable housing, study says. Lots of it.

Boston Globe25-04-2025

The figure makes clear the bleak reality: the state's affordable housing system is no longer a reliable safety net. It is a rare commodity awarded only to a lucky few who, in some instances, quite literally
'The reality is that we need thousands and thousands more units of affordable housing for people of every income, every household size, in every place in Massachusetts,' said Jessie Partridge Guerrero, director of data services at the Metropolitan Area Planning Council, which wrote the report with Housing Navigator Massachusetts, a nonprofit that created a statewide centralized affordable housing waitlist. 'It's not necessarily shocking information, but the scale of that number certainly puts into perspective how far away we are from solving this problem.'
Unsurprisingly, the state's 'affordability gap,' as researchers describe it, is the worst for the state's poorest residents.
Advertisement
Of those 441,000 households who qualify for affordable housing but can't access it, some 44 percent are considered extremely low-income, meaning they make 30 percent of the area median income — in Greater Boston that's $48,950 for a family of four — or less.
Advertisement
Those residents qualify for the government's deepest affordable housing subsidies such as
The Stone Mill Lofts in Lawrence, an old mill building converted into energy-efficient affordable housing.
David L. Ryan/Globe Staff
The result is families who end up paying huge portions of their income toward rent, or endure overcrowded apartments, illegal or unsafe units, or in extreme cases, homelessness.
For families who earn just a little more — 'very low income' households between 30 and 50 percent of the AMI — there are even fewer resources, the report found, because most state and federal programs target either the poorest residents or middle income earners, not anyone in between.
Section 8 and public housing are designated for the state's poorest families, and the popular state affordable programs Chapter 40B and inclusionary zoning typically build units for people earning 80 percent of AMI.
The people in between, 30 to 50 percent AMI earners, make too much money for public housing, and too little for inclusionary zoning units. The result is that 81 percent of those households do not live in affordable housing, the report found.
'We call it the missing middle,' said Jerome DuVal, executive director of Housing Navigator. 'We have programs for people earning more than them, and programs for people earning much less. But in this push to build more, we've missed some folks who need an affordable home.'
And while the state has a shortage of affordable units for families, the greatest need is for homes that can house 'small households' with one or two members. That, the reports' authors say, is at least a positive note, because those homes are smaller, cheaper, and easier to build.
Advertisement
The underlying problem is that the state has not built nearly enough affordable housing in recent decades. At the same time, the price of market-rate homes has soared, and 'naturally occurring affordable housing' like older triple-decker units that rented for cheap, have been flipped, upgraded, or simply had rents raised.
Classic three-deckers and other small multi-family buildings, which have long provided a stock of relatively affordable rental housing in Eastern Massachusetts, have in recent years been increasingly converted to more expensive for-sale condos.
David L. Ryan/Globe Staff
And income growth has not kept up with the pace of housing price growth, meaning more people than ever qualify for affordable housing.
The aim of the report, said DuVal, is to encourage state policymakers to consider solutions to the state's deep housing shortage will stimulate building for people at all income levels. Simply building market-rate housing, while important, won't provide immediate relief for the people who need it the most.
'The urgency to build a lot more housing is real,' said DuVal. 'But we want to make sure that its not just about more. It's also about ensuring we build the right kinds of housing for the right people in the right places.'
Andrew Brinker can be reached at

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

‘It's a net positive for us.' For some US manufacturers, Trump tariffs pay off
‘It's a net positive for us.' For some US manufacturers, Trump tariffs pay off

Boston Globe

time20 hours ago

  • Boston Globe

‘It's a net positive for us.' For some US manufacturers, Trump tariffs pay off

AccuRounds is exactly the kind of high-end manufacturing company that's supposed to benefit from the Trump tariffs —and right now the plan seems to be working. After a sluggish 2024, AccuRounds workers are putting in overtime as they transform steel rods into hundreds of highly specialized industrial gadgets, and the company is looking to hire. Revenues were up by 20 percent in the first quarter of 2025 and Tamasi expects the same for the current quarter. Revenues last year came to about $20 million, he said. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up AccuRounds makes precisely machined pieces of metal that mostly go inside bigger machines, ranging from commercial aircraft to industrial robots to drug manufacturing systems. For instance, one component goes into a pump that excretes the glue used to assemble iPhones. Another is a driveshaft that's found in most of the machines used worldwide to make influenza vaccines. Advertisement AccuRounds also makes surgical tools such as trephenes, the razor-sharp cookie cutters used to extract diseased corneas from human eyes during transplant procedures. AccuRounds even makes components for high-end flutes played by professional musicians. Advertisement AccuRounds is nothing like the grimy machine shops of old. It's clean and well-lit, with a multitude of computer-guided milling machines, each costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. The Plexiglass windows on each machine are splashed by a constant spray of cutting oil, which cools and lubricates the cutting tools and washes away metal debris. Twelve-foot steel rods are fed into the mill, where they're automatically shaped, drilled and cut into the proper shape, then dropped into a finished-parts bin. Lately the company's installed robotic arms at some of the milling machines. Made by Universal Robots, a Danish company owned by North Reading-based That doesn't mean fewer jobs, Tamasi said, just different ones. 'It's a commitment that we've made to our team here, that technology, The company's recent revenue surge began right after the re-election of Donald Trump, who'd campaigned on a promise to revive US manufacturing by levying high tariffs on imports. 'It was the end of November, early December,' said Tamasi. 'That's when we started to see things turn.' One customer who had been purchasing from machine shops in Singapore and China told Tamasi that the impending tariffs had cause a change of heart. 'They mentioned they spent a couple of years farming work out,' Tamasi said. 'Now they're looking at bringing that work back.' Advertisement Mark Curtin inspected a finished product at AccuRounds. Matthew J. Lee/Globe Staff It's a reminder that tariffs aren't all bad. And AccuRounds isn't the only local manufacturer to benefit. Canton-based Company president Brian Buyea said that even before Trump took office, he was hearing from customers looking to 'reshore' their supply chain with US-made circuit boards. 'Now you start to add the tariffs on top of that, it's started to give us a little more of a positive boost,' Buyea said. Because the Trump administration has so frequently raised and lowered its proposed tariff rates, Buyea couldn't predict their effect on Remtec's revenues. 'It could be anything from a 10 percent pickup for us, to, we could double our business,' he said. Even skeptics concede that import taxes can benefit domestic manufacturers by driving up the cost of products made by foreign competitors. 'These types of polices inevitably have some winners, at least in the short term,' said Scott Lincicome, economist at the To Lincicome. tariffs produce far more losers than winners, as businesses and consumers throughout the economy end up paying more for products. Either they keep buying imports, and pay the tariff, or they switch to more expensive US sources. Many domestic companies use higher tariffs as an opportunity to raise their own prices. And as domestic orders surge, some companies must invest in new plant and equipment, and their new customers will pay for it. 'Over time, you're getting slower growth and a less efficient, less productive economy,' said Lincicome. Advertisement AccuRounds derives only about 5 percent of its revenue from exports, so the company won't suffer much if foreign nations aim retaliatory tariffs at US goods. But the Trump tariffs make it more expensive for manufacturers to purchase the supplies and equipment they need. Steel tariffs are a problem, Tamasi admitted. He'd happily buy US-made steel but 'the quality and the consistency is not there,' he said. 'We've tried everyone.' So he'll keep importing the steel despite the administration's 50 percent tariff. However, AccuRounds' sales contracts stipulate that the company can pass on any increases in steel costs to the end user, shielding AccuRounds from the tariff burden. There's no way around it, said Tamasi. 'If we had to absorb all price increases,' he said, 'we wouldn't be able to compete.' An even bigger hit could come from purchasing new milling machines, priced at half a million dollars or more even before the tariffs. The only ones worth buying, Tamasi said, are made in Switzerland, Germany and Japan. No US company makes the machines he needs, Tamasi said there's no way he can pass this tariff bill directly to customers, but in the long run it could well push his prices higher. Still, if Tamasi's customers are willing to pick up the tab, AccuRounds is a likely victor of the tariff wars. AccuRounds makes specialized metal parts. Matthew J. Lee/Globe Staff Hiawatha Bray can be reached at

Imports plummet in April as tariffs weigh on trade
Imports plummet in April as tariffs weigh on trade

Boston Globe

time6 days ago

  • Boston Globe

Imports plummet in April as tariffs weigh on trade

Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up REAL ESTATE Advertisement Healey administration sets aside more than $7 million for office-to-residential conversions The Healey administration this week announced it had awarded more than $7 million to help spur two office-to-residential conversion projects in downtown Boston. Woburn-based KS Partners won $3.4 million to convert 15 Court Square. Jessica Rinaldi/Globe Staff The Healey administration this week announced it had awarded more than $7 million to help spur two office-to-residential conversion projects in downtown Boston. A proposal to convert 31 Milk St. from Dinosaur Capital Partners of Newton was awarded $4 million, while Woburn-based KS Partners won $3.4 million to convert 15 Court Square. The Milk Street conversion is due to carve out 110 new rental units on the building's office floors, including 22 income-restricted apartments, while 80 apartments are planned for 15 Court Square, including 16 affordable ones. The state money is coming from $15 million that Governor Maura Healey set aside last year from the state's Affordable Housing Trust Fund, to help developers planning larger office conversions in downtown Boston finance their projects. So far, at least 15 applications have been filed in Boston to take advantage of the city's own program for office-to-residential conversions, which offers as much as 75 percent off property tax bills for up to 29 years. But construction has so far begun on only one project, building 15 apartments at 281 Franklin St. The Wu administration said on Wednesday that construction on the Milk Street and Court Square projects should begin by the end of the year. — JON CHESTO Advertisement LAYOFFS Pampers maker Procter & Gamble to cut up to 7,000 jobs as companies are buffeted by higher costs The Proctor & Gamble headquarters complex is seen in downtown Cincinnati in 2015. John Minchillo/Associated Press Procter & Gamble will cut up to 7,000 jobs over the next two years as the maker of Tide detergent and Pampers diapers implements a restructuring program at a time when tariffs are raising costs for American companies and consumers are growing anxious about the economy. The job cuts, announced at the Deutsche Bank Consumer Conference in Paris on Thursday, make up approximately 6 percent of the company's global workforce, or about 15 percent of its nonmanufacturing positions, said chief financial officer Andre Schulten. Procter & Gamble, based in Cincinnati, had approximately 108,000 employees worldwide in June 2024. The cuts are part of a broader restructuring program. Procter & Gamble will also end sales of some of its products in certain markets. Procter & Gamble said it will provide more details about that in July. — ASSOCIATED PRESS ECONOMY The number of Americans filing for jobless benefits last week rises to highest level in eight months Filings for US unemployment benefits rose to their highest level in eight months last week but remain historically low despite growing uncertainty about how tariffs could impact the broader economy. New applications for jobless benefits rose by 8,000 to 247,000 for the week ending May 31, the Labor Department said Thursday. That's the most since early October. Analysts had forecast 237,000 new applications. Weekly applications for jobless benefits are considered representative of US layoffs and have mostly bounced around a historically healthy range between 200,000 and 250,000 since COVID-19 throttled the economy five years ago, wiping out millions of jobs. — ASSOCIATED PRESS Advertisement BANKRUPTCY 23andMe's DNA data soars in value with new $305 million bid Signage at 23andMe headquarters in Sunnyvale, Calif., in 2021. David Paul Morris/Photographer: David Paul Morris/ Bankrupt genetic analysis company 23andMe will hold a second auction for its cache of DNA data with an opening bid of $305 million from a group led by the company's former chief executive, Anne Wojcicki. The offer is nearly $50 million more than the last bid from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, which had been declared the winner of the first auction last month, only to have the outcome challenged in court by Wojcicki. The new auction is a compromise between Wojcicki, Regeneron, and 23andMe, all of whom had come to federal court in St. Louis on Wednesday prepared to fight over the best way to set up a new round of bidding. 23andMe had initially proposed limits on the new auction that were questioned by US Bankruptcy Judge Brian Walsh. At the start of the hearing on Wednesday, Walsh asked lawyers for Regeneron and 23andMe to justify the proposed auction rules, including a $10 million breakup fee and a limit to the bidding, which he said may be 'inefficient.' Under the new rules, Wojcicki, who is partnering with a California-based research institute, would make a bid of $305 million, which Regeneron can counter with an offer that must be at least $315 million, company attorney Christopher Hopkins told Walsh. After that, Wojcicki and the research institute can make their final bid. If they do, Regeneron gets the chance to make the last offer of the auction. — BLOOMBERG NEWS Advertisement LEGAL Mattel settles baby sleeper death suits before start of a trial Mattel headquarters in El Segundo, Calif. Bing Guan/Bloomberg Mattel Inc. and its Fisher-Price unit have settled lawsuits alleging their recalled Rock 'n Play baby sleeper was so defectively designed that it led to the deaths of infants. The agreement, disclosed in a Delaware court filing last week, resolves lawsuits over six death cases and four allegations the faulty design of the Rock 'n Play product led to babies suffering flattened heads when they rolled against the product's side, said Michael Trunk, an attorney representing victims who settled their cases. He declined to provide financial terms. Among the cases settled was a suit filed by Ameena Brown over the death of her son, identified in court filings only as AB. Jury selection in her case was slated to start Thursday in Delaware. There are at least four other such cases pending in Delaware Superior Court. A representative of Mattel declined to comment. Mattel acquired Fisher-Price in 1993 in a deal valued at $1 billion. — BLOOMBERG NEWS GAMING Eager fans endure long lines for the Nintendo Switch 2 launch A Nintendo Switch 2 is sold at the Nintendo store in New York's Rockefeller Center on June 5. Richard Drew/Associated Press Eager customers lined up outside electronics stores in Tokyo hours in advance to collect their pre-ordered Nintendo Switch 2 video game consoles. The much anticipated Switch 2, being released around the world Thursday, is an upgrade to its eight-year-old predecessor with new social features meant to draw players into online gaming. Nintendo is counting on the Switch 2 to boost sagging sales. In the United States, a chaotic pre-order process in April left some fans frustrated after the consoles quickly sold out. Still, some eager fans lined up early Thursday at retailers such as Target in hopes of purchasing a unit. 'I'm just rolling the dice here,' said Edgar Huo, who was in a line of about 25 outside of a Target in the Tribeca neighborhood of Manhattan. — ASSOCIATED PRESS Advertisement TOURISM Where Canadians are traveling this summer now that they're avoiding the US Canadians are traveling more this summer than they did last year — just not to the United States. According to data from Statistics Canada, the government's data-crunching agency, they have logged 10 percent more flights to overseas countries in the first five months of 2025 than they did in 2024. In that same period, they also curbed their flights to the United States by 20 percent. Car trips across the border have declined by 35 percent, leaving US border towns ravaged. The dominant winner in this behavioral shift are Caribbean countries. According to a May 2025 report from flight and ticketing analytics firm ForwardKeys, summer flight searches to the region have increased by 22 percent from last year, more than to anywhere else. Data shared with Bloomberg by the Caribbean Tourism Organization also shows that at least a half-dozen island nations have so far documented gains in Canadian arrivals, with Bermuda taking the lion's share. Although its weather is more consistent with the mid-Atlantic — with optimal temperatures in the summer — it already saw Canadian visits grow by 34 percent in the first quarter of the year. — BLOOMBERG NEWS

Tiny Fupo in Cambridge's Huron Village is serving a Chinese and fusion menu
Tiny Fupo in Cambridge's Huron Village is serving a Chinese and fusion menu

Boston Globe

time6 days ago

  • Boston Globe

Tiny Fupo in Cambridge's Huron Village is serving a Chinese and fusion menu

The Backstory Before they opened Fupo, Xuyang (Benny) Zhang was an R&D mechanical engineer, and his wife, Qianyi Lin, worked as a business intelligence analyst. When they decided to open a restaurant, they returned to China — he is from Canton and she is from Sichuan — and tried food from many regions to see what they wanted to bring to their new place. The Chinese beef flatbread at Fupo. Suzanne Kreiter/Globe Staff What to Eat Chinese beef-stuffed flatbread, from the street food section of the menu, with a flattened patty seasoned with red and green Sichuan peppercorns baked inside a yeast dough. It's delicious. Roasted dumplings (eight to an order) with vegetables, chicken, or pork, with crispy edges and juicy filling. Stir-fried broccoli with garlic, perfectly cooked, almost crunchy. Cold noodles (with or without shredded chicken) with carrots and cucumber and a chile oil sauce you add yourself, so you're in charge of the heat. You'll find vegan dishes, such as noodles tossed with stir-fried zucchini slices; familiar food such as egg and veggie fried rice or roasted pork ribs; family fare as in thin-crust pizza; exciting specialties such as Sichuan peppercorn shrimp pasta; and unusual offerings such as brown sugar buns. The dumplings at Fupo. Suzanne Kreiter/Globe Staff Advertisement What to Drink Regular coffee and latte, plus many versions of iced latte, including lavender, Nutella, and banana; several matcha drinks; and more bottles and cans to choose from. Advertisement The Takeaway Fupo means 'rich lady' in Mandarin. When Qianyi Lin told a friend that she and her husband were opening a restaurant, he wished them great success and hoped she became rich, hence the name. The couple is very enthusiastic and accommodating, and their food is quite fresh, prepared with care, and mostly healthy. This is a shoestring operation with 16 seats. You want to encourage and patronize a sweet place like this. 359 Huron Ave., Huron Village, Cambridge, 617-491-3133. Dumplings, noodles, vegetables $9.95-$22.95; meat and seafood $8.25-$26.95. Sheryl Julian can be reached at

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into the world of global news and events? Download our app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store