Sacramento Business Journal Article March 2025

Housing costs in California have remained high over the last 30 years despite more housing being added to the market, according to a recent report by the Public Policy Institute of California.

It’s tough out there for both aspiring homeowners and for those in the rental market. The average house in Sacramento County costs $516,000, and renters in the county have to earn $32.91 per hour to afford the average monthly asking rent of $1,712, according to the county’s latest Affordable Housing Needs Report, released in May 2024. Additionally, the county’s latest Point-in-Time count found that 58% of people affected by homelessness believed the most important thing the Sacramento region could do to reduce homelessness was to increase affordable housing.

While many factors contribute to California's housing crisis and growing unhoused population, Amber Lane Celmer, the executive director of HomeAid Sacramento, explained that rising costs across industries is one big issue. “The prices of materials and labor have certainly gone up,” Celmer said. "That’s a major contributing factor.”

HomeAid Sacramento’s mission is to help people that are experiencing or at risk of homelessness create and build new chapters of their lives through “construction, community engagement and education.” HomeAid Sacramento has been affiliated with the national HomeAid America since 1998.

As the charitable partner to its parent organization, the North State Building Industry Association, HomeAid Sacramento’s work is made possible through contributions from the association and other donors. Founded in 1944, North State BIA is a group of industry homebuilders, developers and associated professionals that advocate on behalf of the homebuilding industry. HomeAid Sacramento operates under an executive committee, board of directors and staff separate from that of North State BIA.

We recently spoke with Celmer about how the building industry can better address the housing crisis.

What is HomeAid Sacramento and how does it relate to Sacramento's affordable housing crisis?

In essence, we're developers. We're a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. We build and renovate shelters and transitional housing facilities for those who are either at risk of being unhoused or already unhoused. We partner with local nonprofits or providers to help them increase their capacity to serve.

We are the charitable arm of the North State Building Industry Association. That is what gives us these relationships with builders and trade partners. We bring them on board, and what helps us garner in-kind donations of supplies such as labor and materials as well as furniture, appliances — say there was a million-dollar project — we could potentially cut that in half or more. We've actually done projects at 100% in-kind because of our access to the building industry. We also have different drives throughout the year that bring in blankets, shoes, and other essential items like toiletry items, feminine hygiene products, diapers [and] formula.

What do you see as promising solutions to addressing the issue of housing?

I would say reducing [construction] fees. … I would [also] say affordability. [People] are having to live off of dual income households, but they don't necessarily have the support around their families. Anything that can be done to provide services to those who are below the poverty level or who require mental health services, therapies and such, I think that would probably put us in a much better situation.

What are some of the limitations around reducing building fees and trying to accommodate for the cost of labor to make things more affordable?

It's just a lack of understanding. The right hand isn’t talking to the left hand. There will be this demand of the building industry, with the lack of understanding of what [certain building regulations] will mean [for the market]. The process of obtaining permits to build in California can be lengthy and bureaucratic, adding to development costs. [OSHA could say,] “We're going to slap this guideline on housing that's going to require you to change your safety model or how many people you have on site,” but with the lack of understanding of what that's going to do to the price of homes because that cost [has to] go somewhere.

The building industry needs to have a little bit more of a space at the table to discuss these laws and regulations before they go into effect. Certainly, the lack of federal and state investment in affordable housing and, not to mention, the restrictive zoning laws that make it increasingly difficult to build new housing. In California, the most significant zoning restrictions that make it difficult to build are primarily related to single-family zoning, which limits the construction of multi-unit housing by requiring large lot sizes, strict height restrictions, and restrictions on accessory dwelling units (ADUs), effectively preventing denser development and contributing to housing affordability issues in many areas.

The wages for low-income households are not catching up with the uptick in housing costs, which can result in many families parting with well over half of their incomes on rent alone — this is true for 70% of low-income families. Assistance is also lacking in a big way with only 25% of extremely low-income families who are in need of assistance actually receiving it.

What solutions offer the most potential to solve the problem?

Reducing fees for builders and in the building industry, it's going to help them eat the cost of homes down. That gives affordability and more access to housing. That's always been a major issue and a major contributing factor. The more we can do that, the more that we can reduce the fees, create access. The other thing that brings the rise of the cost of homes is certainly the cost of labor, and a lot of other major loops that the industry has to jump through, [such as] safety issues, ever-changing laws and [additional] distance training. … Those are all things that raise the cost of housing.

What are some ongoing projects that you have going on?

So we are building an ADU for Advocates for Mentally Ill Housing. [AMIH] supports their advocates for housing. We have a facility in Placer County that is dedicated to [adults living with mental illness]. There's land next to them that we're building from the ground structure. It's going to be an ADU that can serve up to three more individuals. That's something that we're working on actively.

We're also working on a big, 50-cabins community. The cabins are already built, but we're doing a beautification project, a beautification event for our building industry where we just completed the flat work.

Do you have anything else that you would like to add?

The only point I like to really drive home on these things is I think quite often the building industry has one perception of them and it's not always fantastic. The industry not only [helps to] create memories through their master plan communities, they're creating memories that children will have for a lifetime riding their bikes in a cul-de-sac. Without these communities, there wouldn't be schools. Beyond that, they care deeply about the community and they care deeply about the housing crisis. For me, it's just refreshing to see the building industry step up in such a great way beyond their craft to be there for those who are less fortunate.