Reports

This research brief discusses some of the key issues that emerged from these discussions and includes new data analysis highlighting the characteristics and spatial patterns of properties owned by older adults in Chicago.

This analysis documents the importance that 2 to 4 unit buildings play in homebuying for Chicago’s borrowers and neighborhoods of color and helps connect policy priorities around preserving 2 to 4s with those that advance homeownership and wealth-building for moderate- and middle-income Black and Latino households.

The development of impactful policy to address the unique housing needs of Cook County’s older adults requires local and timely data on changing conditions, informed by the data needs of issue-area stakeholders. This analysis leverages the local knowledge of roughly 20 Chicago-area organizations working on older adult housing issues to create a practitioner-focused resource on key demographic and socioeconomic conditions related to older-adult housing demand and economic and housing insecurity in Cook County.

Chicago’s diverse stock of naturally occurring affordable housing (NOAH) faces a variety of challenges. A new report and resource clearinghouse from The Preservation Lab, an initiative co-led by the Institute for Housing Studies and The Preservation Compact, documents the risks and pressures facing NOAH buildings, owners, and tenants in different market contexts and provides resources and guiding principles to assist community stakeholders in developing tailored NOAH preservation strategies.

Facilitated by the Chicago Community Trust’s Protecting and Advancing Equitable Homeownership initiative, the Institute for Housing Studies at DePaul University (IHS) partnered with the Urban Institute to develop a data resource for Chicago practitioners, policymakers, and advocates working to reduce the racial homeownership gap. Read more about Chicago Housing Overview: Preserving Affordability and Expanding Accessibility here.

This analysis uses a unique data set to document the loss of the 2 to 4 stock in Chicago neighborhoods in an effort to understand the different ways that market forces put pressure on this key segment of the city’s housing market.

To inform ongoing policy conversations related to the preservation of 2 to 4 buildings in Chicago neighborhoods, this report updates key contextual data on the stock of 2 to 4s in Chicago, and includes new data on the characteristics of the stock, foreclosure impacts, and the importance of 2 to 4s in communities of color and for households of color.

The Preservation Lab is an initiative co-directed by the Institute for Housing Studies at DePaul University (IHS) and The Preservation Compact that aims to investigate complex and timely affordable housing topics and inform affordable housing policy through applied research and stakeholder engagement.

Through the City Tech Connect Chicago Innovation Program, the Institute for Housing Studies at DePaul University (IHS) and MAPSCorps teamed up to create data indicators, sustainable processes, and tools to help community organizations access, analyze, and compare neighborhood-level data that can be leveraged to support local policies and issues.

This report goes “under the hood” of our Mapping Displacement Pressure in Chicago data to highlight how house prices are changing in the neighborhoods around The 606 and identifies potential opportunities to preserve affordability in surrounding communities.