Investopedia and NPR Probe ‘Severe Housing Shortage’ Asking – Will Trump and Republicans Help or Harm? Broad Look plus Manufactured Housing FEA with Sunday Weekly MHVille Headlines Recap
Before diving into what Investopedia and left-leaning NPR said about the “severe housing shortage” that Biden-Harris have handed off it is appropriate to briefly consider the first 30 days of the historic non-consecutive presidential terms of 45th and 47th President of the United States (POTUS) Donald J. Trump are completed. Per reports, DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) has announced that 55 billion dollars have been saved thus far and that potentially trillions of dollars in past waste, fraud and abuse of been spotted. Costly DEI programs and much of the work of USAID has been halted. Pundits and journalists on both sides of the left-right media divide are naturally weighing in to slam, praise, or otherwise parse the first third of POTUS Trump’s 2nd “first 100 days.” For example, some Democrats are portraying these cost-savings measures as somehow bad. The Center Square aptly observed in an article linked here that “Just a month into office, President Donald Trump has already begun a major overhaul of how things are done in the federal government. But his plans for transformation face a major question: will it last? Trump has issued a flurry of executive orders, has begun slashing federal spending and shrinking the size of government, but unless Congress aggressively passes laws to codify these cuts and changes, these reforms could be as short-lived as Trump’s remaining four years in office.” What the Congressional wing of the Grand Old Party (GOP a.k.a. the Republican Party) does in the coming weeks will potentially be as important as what Trump 2.0 (a.k.a. T2), his cabinet and DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) team does. The early indicators are that Congressional Republicans may not be as aggressive as the Trump team and DOGE has been. All of that and more are operating in the background of the headline topics that follow.
As regular MHProNews readers may know, FEA is short for facts, evidence, and analysis. MHVille is an affectionate term that reflects the fact that manufactured housing in the 21st century has been dramatically diminished due in large part to problematic public policies at the local, state, and federal levels.
Part I – According to left-leaning NPR is the following by Tonya Mosley Entitled “The U.S. is facing a severe housing shortage. Will Trump’s proposals help?”
Quoting that article by NPR.
Heading into 2025, housing remains one of the most important issues on the minds of millions of Americans. For many, the dream of owning, or even renting, a place of their own is in peril. In some cities, people are paying $1 million for “starter” homes, while about half of renters are spending more than 30% of their income on housing.
There is no clear mention there of the obvious: namely, that the Biden-Harris (D) regime policies caused housing costs to skyrocket and caused homelessness to soar to reportedly record high, according to Biden HUD’s appointee, Marcia Fudge in her annual report to Congress.
Ben Keys, an economist with the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School, characterizes the current market as “deeply unaffordable.” Keys traces some of the current problems back to the financial crisis of 2008.
“We saw a collapse in construction, and so we just stopped building houses, we stopped building apartments for a few years there,” he says. “Now we’re seeing estimates of as much as four million houses that we’re short.”
Keys notes that new construction is occurring “at a snail’s pace,” due, in part, to the high cost of labor and materials and the difficulty of financing large projects. He says that zoning laws and land use restrictions can also contribute to a housing shortage: “[These] policies create a lot of hoops to jump through and make it challenging for developers who would like to build at the scale where they would like to build.”
Something else not mentioned by NPR’s article is the potential role of HUD Code manufactured housing and how failure to enforce the overcoming zoning barriers tool of federal “enhanced preemption” could make the difference, thanks to enactment of the Manufactured Housing Improvement Act of 2000 (a.k.a.: MHIA, MHIA 2000, 2000 Reform Act, 2000 Reform Law). Oddly, then Senator Joe Biden (DE-D) was a cosponsor of the legislation that years later under Obama-Biden or the Biden-Harris time in office failed to enforce, just have the two prior Republican administrations of the 21st century.
Mosley wrote this:
I don’t think that there is a strong connection between this idea of removing immigrants from our country and making housing more affordable.
Mosley/NPR made similar claims that Alice Carter did, namely, that the people who are building housing are often immigrants. Which is to say that NPR’s and The Northern Forum made similar logical errors. See the article linked below for details.
Mosely/NPR also said that tariffs would raise housing costs, but that may not be true either. There is some early evidence that nations hit by tariffs are taking steps to devalue their currency to counter the effects of Trump tariffs. The net result is that costs may not be going higher. Additionally, the aim is to bolster domestic production and bolster demand for more U.S. labor, raising incomes.
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Deportations will lower housing costs, result in rising wages, improve schools that can’t teach as well with illegals who can’t speak English, alleviate pressure on hospitals, lower all kinds of social welfare costs – it’s a no-brainer for the working and middle class.…
Keep in mind that MHProNews reported on just those sorts of insights during the 2024 campaign (the below was uploaded on July 7, 2024, thus has historic insights), which caused many on ‘Wall Street’ to oppose Trump and support Kamala Harris. The economics of this is in some ways predictable. Cheap foreign labor domestically and cheap imports are useful to specific types of firms that have in several cases aligned themselves with Democratic politics.
Furthermore, Mosely/NPR assert that climate change is a problem driving housing costs, something that Trump and many Republicans deny with evidence. A look at that topic is linked below.
The number of extremely affordable rental units has plummeted in recent years, and this ties back into a housing shortage. Where does that housing shortage squeeze the most? It’s going to squeeze the most at the very bottom of the property ladder. Landlords who previously offered very affordable units have seen a great deal of demand for those units. They’re able to raise the rents. And so we’ve seen a lot of people fall off the bottom of the rental market, and that’s led to a ton of pressure, especially in expensive markets, and I think in many ways the diagnosis is quite clear that we have this supply-and-demand imbalance.
Perhaps left-leaning bias keeps Mosely/NPR from recognizing the role that Biden-Harris (D) and Democratic policies fueled that crisis. It is simply common sense that letting millions of new people into the country, legally and illegally, was going to sharply increase demand.
As leftist Michael Weinstein aptly noted, ‘tens of billions of dollars’ poured into the ‘affordable housing industrial complex’ were ‘wasted.’ Weinstein blamed Democrats and Democratic policies.
And so the cure is that we need more housing, that we need to prioritize housing.
And then, they point to Biden era “Housing First” policies, without pointing to the drivers of inflation that resulted in higher costs to build, higher mortgage rates, millions of more people competing for housing, and the array of policies that made Biden-Harris policies little more than lip service or window covering for fueling a crisis that Democratic policies had fueled. See the reports linked below for details and the manufactured housing angles on those specifics.
But manufactured housing industry professionals ought to view the above by Mosely/NPR in part through the lens of our industry. How is it possible that Mosely/NPR failed to even mention the most affordable form of new permanent construction in the U.S.? Restated, how good could their analysis be without mentioning manufactured housing? Furthermore, that points to an apparent failure on the part of the Manufactured Housing Institute (MHI) which boldly claims on their home page that they are “elevating” “attainable” manufactured housing. If so, why is it that manufactured homes are less ‘attainable’ (think affordable) than 4 years ago? Why is it that with MHI’s claimed “partnership” with HUD that they can’t get the 2000 Reform Law and enhanced preemption enforced? So, there are an array of issues that manufactured housing is facing headwinds that are to some extent caused by external as well as internal problems (think MHI and the consolidation-focused agenda of many of their dominating members).
Oxford Languages defines attainable as: “able to be attained; achievable.” Why did MHI abandon the term “affordable” on its home page, when there is a known formula that defines what affordable housing is? As the National League of Cities said, using a definition provided by HUD and others is the following.
“Affordable housing” as housing on which the occupant is paying no more than 30 percent of gross income for housing costs, including utilities.”
It seems that MHI is more interested in sounding “politically correct” than they are in advocating for “all segments” of the industry in a manner that would genuinely result in a surge in affordable manufactured home production, the KPI or Key Performance Indicator that MHI has largely ignored for far too long. As Noam Chomsky explained it, “That’s the whole point of good propaganda. You want to create a slogan that nobody’s going to be against, and everybody’s going to be for.” It takes time to dissect or “fisk” an argument, and many don’t take the time to do so, which is why propaganda and paltering works in many instances.
More could be said, but that’s sufficient to now advance to what Investopedia recently said about the Trump housing policies.
Part II
Trump’s Policies Could Strengthen—Or Slow—the Housing Market. Here’s How.
Key Takeaways
With a Republican sweep of the House and Senate in the 2024 election, President-elect Donald Trump has the opportunity to bolster or hamper the U.S. housing market.
Trump’s proposals to deregulate home construction and open federal land could help homebuilders expand inventory and lower prices.
During his campaign, Trump also proposed tax and tariff policies that could keep mortgage rates high.
MHProNews notes that a similar flaw is made in that third bullet that was made by NPR and others. It should be obvious that Trump’s tax and tariff policies in his first term DID NOT fuel inflation or interest rates. That was caused by Biden-Harris era policies, as then Democratic House Majority Whip James Clyburn (SC-D) admitted in an interview with left-leaning MSNBC.
It isn’t just homelessness that rose under Biden-Harris policies, poverty reportedly rose too.
Pumping trillions of dollars into the economy may have seemed like a boost to the poor or lower incomes initially. But increasing the money supply resulted in inflation, as then Democratic House Majority Whip James Clyburn (SC-D) plainly told MSNBC. Inflation hits the lower incomes harder. But even the middle class has been harmed, as some 50 percent of the U.S. now says they are living paycheck-to-paycheck.
Poverty under Trump declined. Poverty Under Obama-Biden (D) and Biden-Harris (D) increased.
Poverty was lower under Trump Administration than it was under Obama-Biden or Biden Harris. and their corporate interests. Note: depending on your browser or device, many images in this report and others on MHProNews can be clicked to expand. Click the image and follow the prompts. For example, in some browsers/devices you click the image and select ‘open in a new window.’ After clicking that selection you click the image in the open window to expand the image to a larger size. To return to this page, use your back key, escape or follow the prompts.
The arguably left-leaning Peter G. Peterson foundation noted that poverty rose sharply after Biden-Harris (D) policies went into effect.
Note: depending on your browser or device, many images in this report and others on MHProNews can be clicked to expand. Click the image and follow the prompts. For example, in some browsers/devices you click the image and select ‘open in a new window.’ After clicking that selection, you click the image in the open window to expand the image to a larger size. To return to this page, use your back key, escape or follow the prompts.
Those points noted, back to Investopedia’s narrative.
President-elect Donald Trump has the opportunity to significantly impact the U.S. housing market, especially with a Republican sweep of both the House and the Senate. But what shape might those effects take?
“The size and direction of a ‘Trump bump’ will depend on what campaign proposals ultimately become policy and when,” said Danielle Hale, chief economist for Realtor.com. “The new administration’s policies have the potential to enhance or hamper the housing recovery, and the details will matter.”1
Some policies espoused by Trump could make it easier for new housing supply to hit the market. Meanwhile, while the president does not set mortgage rates, some of Trump’s proposed policy changes could influence their trajectory.
Trump Policies Could Aid Housing Supply
The National Association of Realtors in 2023 estimated that there was a nationwide housing shortage of between 4 million and 6 million homes.2 Of the available homes, only 23% were affordable to households earning a median income of $75,000 or lower.
Trump in his presidential agenda proposed opening up “limited portions of federal land to allow for new home construction.” As president, Trump could have the leverage to make housing construction easier, increasing inventory, according to Hale.
Trump also said during his campaign that he would address regulations that have made construction harder for home builders. Regulations have caused more than a $93,000 increase in the price of a new home, according to the National Association of Home Builders.3
Some Policies Could Move Mortgage Rates, Hamper Supply
Trump has proposed 10% to 60% tariffs on imports, which some economists say would lead to higher inflation. Trump’s proposals to extend his 2017 Tax Cuts & Jobs Act, cut overtime income from taxes, and end the taxation of social security benefits, among others, would add $7.75 trillion to the projected debt through 2035, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.4
Separately, Trump during his campaign promised “mass deportations” for undocumented immigrants he said have “driven up the cost of housing” by spurring demand. But mass deportations in the short run could also hurt inventory: A third of residential housing construction employees are foreign-born workers, said Realtor.com. …
Once more, Investopedia cited an argument similar to that of Alice Carter and NPR’s, cited above. But that report was fisked below, and neither Carter nor The Northern Forum have publicly responded to that fisking.
Part III Additional Information, Commentary, Analysis plus the Sunday Weekly Headlines in Review
1) Let’s note that while MHProNews has routinely revealed the problematic claims of Democratic economic and housing policies in the 21st century, that doesn’t automatically mean or imply that the Trump policies for manufactured housing are automatically better. More on that in a report planned for this week, perhaps as soon as tomorrow. Stay tuned.
2) What is fair to say is that Trump’s economic policies were clearly superior to those of President George W. Bush (R) and his VP Dick Cheney (R), the later of whom curiously embraced Kamala Harris (D) in the 2024 race. Trump’s policies were demonstrably superior to those of President Obama-Biden (D) and Biden-Harris (D) “Vichy USA” regime.
CNN is not a pro-Trump media outlet, but using federal data, this graphic from their news company reflects the upward trend of income following President Trump’s enactment of the tax cuts and jobs act. It is worth noting that Democratic President John F. Kennedy Jr. did similarly. Income and productivity also rose. During the Reagan Administration, former Democrat turned Republican Ronald Reagan cut taxes with a similar outcome as Presidents Kennedy and Trump. Facts matter.
It is worth noting that President Trump has said that in about 6 to 12 months he will ‘own’ the U.S. economy, and that Biden-Harris (D) policies are still a big factor in the current inflationary picture.
It should be noted that Trump is arguably pragmatic and has been described by some who know him as “transactional.” He wants to be remembered as a positive agent of change who has ushered in the “golden age” of America (see that Masthead and his speech further below). If, for whatever reason, some policy wasn’t working as he hoped, there are good reasons to believe that he would pivot as necessary. But the advantage of Trump 2.0 is that we already know what the first Trump term yielded in the way of economic results, although he didn’t follow a Biden-Harris style inflation in 2017. But overall, there are reasons to think that his policies will result in steady improvements as his policies take hold.
Perfect? No. Better? Yes.
Don’t miss today’s postscript.
With no further adieu, here are the headlines for the week in review from 2.16 to 2.23.2025.
There is word that the prior MHProNews/MHLivingNews eblast created a stir among Clayton Homes and Clayton-aligned sources. As is our practice, MHProNews invites Clayton, MHI, and/or others to provide a written on-the-record response that we are will to publish so long as the language is clean, and evidence is provided to support your position. That said, neither MHI nor Clayton have provided such feedback in quite some time, despite specific as well as public invitations to respond.
MHProNews Programming notice: look for a special report on HUD Secretary E. Scott Turner, a new report on manufactured home communities, plus other topics in the week ahead.
“There are many kinds of journalism, but at the heart of their constitutional responsibilities, journalists are in the business of monitoring and keeping a check on people and institutions in power.” – American Press Institute.Click here to subscribe to the most complete and obviously most read manufactured housing industry news in seconds. Enter your desired email address, press submit, confirm in your inbox. Then You’re All Set for x2 weekly emailed news updates! To report a news tip – either ON or OFF the record – click the image above or send an email to iReportMHNewsTips@mhmsm.com – To help us spot your message in our volume of email, please put the words NEWS TIP or COMMENTS in the subject line. https://www.manufacturedhomepronews.com/shocking-clayton-linked-murder-charge-can-any-volume-of-gaslighting-save-manufactured-housing-institute-ceo-lesli-goochs-failed-flawed-leadership-at-mhi-plus-sunday-weekly-mhvill/ https://www.manufacturedhomepronews.com/its-a-great-observation-follow-the-money-regulatory-capture-iron-triangle-rigged-system-cui-bono-paltering-posturing-illusory-truth-a/
Dozens of more Sunday Weekly headlines recaps are found further below. Learn more to earn more and enjoy.
Our son has grown quite a bit since this 12.2019 photo. All on Capitol Hill were welcoming and interested in our manufactured housing industry related concerns. But Congressman Al Green’s office was tremendous in their hospitality. Our son’s hand is on a package that included the Constitution of the United States, bottled water, and other goodies.
Tony earned a journalism scholarship and earned numerous awards in history and in manufactured housing.
For example, he earned the prestigious Lottinville Award in history from the University of Oklahoma, where he studied history and business management. He’s a managing member and co-founder of LifeStyle Factory Homes, LLC, the parent company to MHProNews, and MHLivingNews.com.
This article reflects the LLC’s and/or the writer’s position and may or may not reflect the views of sponsors or supporters.
