Housing affordability remains a top economic issue globally, and especially for American households, with homeowners’ and renters’ budgets strained by rising costs.
To address this crisis, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently convened an expert panel, selecting Tracy Kijewski-Correa, the William J. Pulte Director of the Keough School’s Pulte Institute for Global Development, to advise on the promise and limits of new building technologies. The GAO provides fact-based, nonpartisan analyses to assist Congress with the oversight of federal programs. Recommendations from the expert panel will inform a public report that will be sent to members of Congress later this year.
Convening with high-level government officials, business leaders and representatives from the nonprofit sector, Kijewski-Correa, professor of global affairs and the Frank M. Freimann Professor of Structural Engineering and Hazard Resilience, shared expertise related to housing planning and design, construction methods and building materials.
Key policy shifts for affordability
Kijewski-Correa said two policy changes are needed to increase housing availability and affordability: zoning reform and adaptive re-use.
“Current zoning regulations in many cities ‘box out’ diverse housing solutions that could address low-income demand, especially what we call the ‘missing middle,’ such as low-density multi-family housing,” she said. “Allowing a wider variety of housing types, including tiny homes, is essential to grow supply.”
Promoting mixed-use development and the conversion of commercial properties — such as abandoned schools, factories and warehouses — into housing could tap into existing inventory, especially for highly vulnerable populations, Kijewski-Correa said.
“This approach is not only cost-effective but also helps to revitalize areas suffering from blight.”
Overcoming resistance to new technology
A civil engineer with interdisciplinary expertise in homeowner responses to housing policy, Kijewski-Correa emphasized the role of behavior change in driving the adoption of new building technologies by homeowners, builders and building officials who oversee regulatory instruments and processes such as building codes and permits.
“New technologies can be very disruptive,” Kijewski-Correa said. “People in the industry may be afraid that they will be replaced by them.”
Kijewski-Correa highlighted the importance of “skilling up” workers through education and job training, citing an Integration Lab (i-Lab) project with Habitat for Humanity in Mexico City and Chennai, India. Working with local masons, a student team used behavior change insights to promote new, safer and more resilient construction methods — such as pre-fabricated home kits — to improve housing quality for low-income families in disaster-prone regions.
Kijewski-Correa also referenced the importance of a comprehensive, lifelong “K-to-grey” workforce development approach that spans from elementary education through a worker’s entire career.
“Through career and technical education programs such as Project Lead the Way, young people interested in the building trades can receive early exposure to new technologies,” she said.
Actionable solutions: regional hubs and resilience
To overcome local barriers to adopting new building methods such as 3D-printing and modular construction, Kijewski-Correa also recommended forming “regional hubs of excellence.”
“Many small municipalities are understaffed and lack the engineering capacity to evaluate and approve new technologies. They will either resist change, or if change is imposed on them, experience significant delays in zoning, permitting and inspection of these new housing models,” she said. “These regional hubs would provide local officials with the necessary training, guidance documents, and even plan review services to confidently update their processes to accommodate new housing technologies.”
Kijewski-Corea leveraged her extensive experience with the Structural Engineering Extreme Events Reconnaissance (StEER) network to emphasize the benefits of technology beyond upfront cost, specifically regarding societal resilience. Through post-disaster surveys, StEER has documented how manufactured housing often performs better than site-built homes in extreme weather events.
“This real-world evidence is critical for dispelling reservations and demonstrating that advanced, factory-built housing is not only safe but can outperform traditional construction,” she said. “In addition, it’s important to remember that life-cycle costs matter. Don’t trade resilience for affordability. Housing that might be cheap to purchase on day one can leave families incredibly vulnerable if it is burned down in a wildfire or destroyed by a hurricane.”
The final takeaway: housing as infrastructure
Ultimately, Kijewski-Correa’s key recommendation for federal agencies and Congress was to fundamentally rethink housing, prioritizing the well-being of residents and the resilience of communities over a purely profit-driven approach.
“Housing is infrastructure, not a commodity,” she said. “It is a foundational component of the nation’s economic, health and educational systems, and by recognizing this, we pave the way for a more equitable and resilient future for all.”