Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Removes Regulatory Barriers to Affordable Home Construction

REMOVING BARRIERS TO BUILDING HOMES: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order to eliminate unnecessary regulatory burdens that delay housing construction and increase housing costs for American families.

• The Order directs the EPA Administrator and the Secretary of the Army to review and revise stormwater, wetlands, and other water-related permitting requirements to reduce building and ownership costs, streamline Federal regulatory approvals, and increase home insurability.
• The Order also directs the Secretary of Commerce, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Secretary of Transportation, and the Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) to eliminate unduly burdensome rules and reform programs that constrain residential development and housing affordability.
• The Secretary of Agriculture, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Secretary of Energy, and the Director of the FHFA are directed to eliminate or reform overly burdensome energy, water, and alternative-energy requirements for housing, including manufactured homes.
• The Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality is directed to issue guidance maximizing categorical exclusions under NEPA for housing construction and related activities.
• The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation is directed to develop guidance simplifying historic preservation reviews to reduce barriers to building housing and related infrastructure.
• The Order calls for Federal agencies to provide incentives to State and local governments that adopt regulatory best practices to speed up permitting, curtail "green" building codes, reduce costly design and building mandates, enable innovative home construction methods, and extend residential development.
• The Order encourages new home construction by aligning Opportunity Zone incentives with single-family home development and New Markets Tax Credit programs.

PROMOTING HOUSING AFFORDABILITY: Layers of red tape, slow permitting processes, and costly environmental mandates imposed by progressive policymakers at the state, local, and Federal level have made it harder and more expensive to build homes in America - leaving families priced out of the market and the American Dream out of reach.

• Unnecessary regulatory barriers have restricted supply, stalled construction, and driven up the cost of building a home - costs that are ultimately borne by homebuyers and renters.
  • For example, some States and localities embed prescriptive green energy mandates in their building codes that can add more than $30,000 to the cost of construction, according to analysis by the Council of Economic Advisors.
  • In 2021, on average, regulations imposed by government at all levels added more than $90,000 to the final price of a new single-family home.
• Complex and slow-moving environmental review requirements delay housing projects for years, discouraging developers and reducing the supply of new homes in communities that need them most.
• Cities imposing arbitrary limits on housing construction make new residential development needlessly difficult.
• President Trump recognizes that homebuilders must be empowered to build and that American families need relief now, which is why he is taking action to remove regulatory barriers to affordable home construction.

DELIVERING ON PROMISES TO AMERICAN FAMILIES: President Trump has undertaken an aggressive agenda to tackle the housing challenges facing American families and make the dream of homeownership accessible again.

• Earlier this year, President Trump signed an Executive Order to prevent large institutional investors from buying single-family homes that could otherwise be purchased by families, and called on Congress to codify these policies.
• President Trump has also directed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to purchase $200 billion in mortgage-backed securities to further drive down borrowing costs.
• These targeted housing and affordability initiatives build on actions President Trump has already taken to put more money in Americans' pockets:
  • Overall deregulation efforts in 2025 are projected to save Americans a collective $212 billion - roughly $2,500 per family of four.
  • He signed the Working Families Tax Cuts into law - delivering the largest tax cut in American history and increasing paychecks by over $10,000 annually for a typical family of four.
  • His America First, pro-growth, energy dominance, and deregulatory agenda has cut red tape, lowered inflation and mortgage rates, boosted GDP growth, and brought trillions in investments to the United States.
• President Trump continues to focus on ways to provide more relief to Americans from the economic and financial mismanagement of the Biden era, so families can prosper and achieve the American Dream of owning a home.