Abundant Housing Illinois

SPRINGFIELD, Illinois – Abundant Housing Illinois, a grass-roots organization that advocates for affordable, sustainable and inclusive cities, is promoting a legislative package intended to make housing development easier. These bills aim to increase housing availability and moderate housing prices.

“Illinois is experiencing a housing shortage, with rental rates and home sale prices rising faster than inflation,” says Eshan Dosani, an Abundant Housing Illinois volunteer activist. “This is a function of supply and demand, but supply is kept needlessly low by restrictions on building housing.”

Since 2012, home prices in Illinois have risen 76%, while inflation has been 37%, according to the St. Louis Fed. Meanwhile, over the same period, in the Chicago metropolitan area, which includes Chicago as well as the cities of Arlington Heights, Aurora, Elgin, Evanston, Joliet, Naperville and Waukegan, rent rose 53%. Rising housing costs are experienced most severely at the lower end of the housing market. Illinois saw a 116% increase in homelessness in 2024 compared to 2023, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

To address the problem, Abundant Housing Illinois is supporting three bills to ease restrictions on building new homes:

● The Affordable Communities Act – H.B. 3288 – allows for the construction of multi-family housing by right in any residential zone in cities with 100,000+ population (Aurora, Chicago, Elgin, Joliet, Naperville, Peoria, Rockford and Springfield). This bill legalizes a variety of housing options in addition to single- family homes, increasing the supply of housing, thereby slowing housing price increases.

● Local–Accessory Dwelling Units – H.B. 3552 – allows accessory dwelling units by right in all residential zones statewide. An accessory dwelling unit is an apartment above or in place of a garage, or a separate unit inside the main structure on a property. These are often known as coach houses or “granny flats.” Accessory dwelling units commonly exist in communities throughout Illinois, but may no longer be built in most municipalities.

● The People over Parking Act – H.B. 3256 and S.B. 2352 – bars cities from imposing parking mandates on development projects located within a half mile of a transit hub.
All three measures are sponsored in the House by State Rep. Kam Buckner (D- Chicago) and State Rep. Michelle Mussman (D-Schaumburg). S.B. 2352 is sponsored by State Sen. Mike Simmons (D-Chicago). “Much of our state's residential land is restricted to single family-only zoning with costly, arbitrary parking mandates that prioritize homes for cars over homes for people— despite the fact that many people prefer to live in apartments, condos, townhouses, and multi-unit buildings like four-flats and six-flats,” Dosani said. “Current laws make housing artificially scarce and, as a result, artificially expensive. We’re not asking for money. We’re asking for regulatory relief that will make housing more affordable for Illinoisans, and for those who want to call Illinois home.”