- Building and lowering the cost of housing is a goal of President Donald Trump. He signed an executive order ordering all federal agencies to improve affordability including housing.
- Neighborhood experts say that changing regulatory processes, increasing the trades workforce and building more starter homes for neighbors could help. As well as an increased income.
- Video shows neighborhood experts talking about what they think needs to be done to make it happen.
"The American dream is becoming harder and harder for our citizens to recognize," Home Builders Association of Michigan CEO Bob Filka said.
It's an issue President Donald Trump wants solved.
He signed an executive order ordering all federal agencies to improve affordability saying "It is critical to restore purchasing power to the American family and improve our quality of life."
I wanted to see how this would impact our neighbors so I went over to the Home Builders Association of Michigan to find out.

"The median price, the typical home being built in Michigan is nearly $450,000," Filka said.
CEO Bob Filka says that's what you buy off the lot.
"More than 25% of the cost of that home is tied to regulatory stuff," Filka said.
That's an average of more than 100-thousand dollars alone going to building codes, compliance, and fees.

And if that sounds expensive, here's the issue.
"There are lower costs, nice attainable options but over the last 10-15 years we haven't been building those types of homes," Filka said.
Experts say the demand for high-end homes has priced out many of our neighbors.
"We also live in a society where we have low stagnant wages, there are hurdles to getting ean ducation, healthcare is unaffordable," MSU Professor Dick Sadler said.

MSU Professor Dick Sadler says those challenges can make buying a home extremely difficult.
"They don't have the same freedom they use to invest more money into saving into down payments for houses," Sadler said.
But Filka believes there are some possible solutions coming from the administration like changing those regulatory processes to lower production costs, increasing trade workforce to grow supply and building more starter homes for neighbors.
"Those three things I would say get you the furthest down the path to fixing the problem," Filka said.
A path to getting our neighbors inside an affordable home.
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