This NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business study quantifies how impact‑driven practices in affordable and moderate‑income multifamily housing translate into higher net operating income and more resilient, risk‑adjusted returns. Using the Multifamily Impact Council’s Framework, the authors show that interventions like rent‑splitting, housing support plans, resident services coordination, tele-health, and solar retrofits lengthen resident tenure, reduce turnover and eviction costs, lower vacancy and bad debt, and cut utility expenses.
Specifically, the NYU research found that:
- Offering services such as telehealth and rent splitting to residents can extend length of stay and reduce turnover costs.
- Housing stability plans boost NOI in project based Section 8 properties.
- Federal and State incentives reduce payback periods for solar installations by more than 5 years.
- Energy retrofits on existing properties beat new construction on embodied carbon costs by 2.7x.
Methodology and Context
NYU's Center for Sustainable Business applied the Multifamily Impact Framework and their existing ROSI methodology to analyze primary company data from six leading affordable multifamily property owners and fund managers.
