D.C.’s signature program for first-time home buyers has run out of money this budget cycle after just three months, disrupting home searches for eligible residents for the second time since June.
The District’s Home Purchase Assistance Program (HPAP), intended to lift people with very low to moderate incomes into homeownership with significant loan assistance, has proved difficult for D.C. residents to navigate over the past year. New financial restrictions on the program in October, designed to spread the funds to more people, upended pending home deals for some of the lowest-income buyers. And unrelenting demand has led to a run on the program’s limited funds: While the $26 million in HPAP funds, which became available last October, was supposed to last through September, the program ran out of money on Thursday.
Just as funds ran out, Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) this week sought to give reprieves to those who were most severely affected by the new restrictions, after legislation passed by the D.C. Council in December aimed to restore their lost opportunities. Those affected — about two dozen people identified so far — had signed home contracts on the expectation they could be eligible for up to $202,000 in assistance, only for a new cap on HPAP aid in October to reduce their assistance by tens of thousands of dollars and derail pending mortgage deals.
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www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2024/01/12/dc-homebuyer-assistance-program-funds-exceptions/
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