“Kansas has been a magnet for economic development lately,” says Jeri Hammerschmidt, a senior housing specialist for First Step Builders in Independence. “Everybody wants to come here. We’ve got the highways and the railways and all of that. But you can’t really recruit these things unless you have your housing and you have your day care, right?” The annual report of the Kansas Housing Resources Corporation (KHRC) shows the agency funded 61 housing developments across the state in 2023, creating 3,234 new homes in 38 counties. Twenty-five developments fell under the “affordable housing” definition and the rest were moderate income, meaning the residents earn too much to qualify for federal housing assistance, yet struggle to afford market rate homes. But that is a pittance compared with what is needed. A comprehensive housing-needs study released in 2022 by the KHRC showed nearly 43,000 housing units are needed across the state by 2028 – a number that does not include the needs in Kansas City or Wichita, or in Shawnee, Sedgwick and Douglas counties.
Source: KLC Journal
