How the ROAD to Housing Act could affect Kerr County’s affordability crisis

A sweeping federal housing package became law over the weekend without President Donald Trump’s signature — and while most of the debate in Washington centered on politics, several provisions inside the bill speak directly to problems Kerr County has been living with since long before the flood, and especially since.

The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act passed the Senate 85-5 and the House 358-32 in late June, then sat on Trump’s desk after he canceled a scheduled signing ceremony in a dispute over an unrelated voter-ID bill. Because Congress remained in session and Trump neither signed nor vetoed it within the constitutional 10-day window, the bill became law automatically.

Supporters call it the most significant federal housing legislation in more than three decades. Much of it won’t touch Kerr County directly, or won’t touch it for years — many of the new grant programs still need federal agencies to write rules before a dollar moves. But several pieces line up closely with problems The Lead has been tracking: falling but still-unaffordable listing prices, a flood-damaged housing stock that outstripped local repair capacity, and a rural county that has never had much luck competing for federal housing dollars built around big-city assumptions.

Here’s where to look.

1. A permanent home for disaster recovery money

The law permanently authorizes the Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery program and creates a new Office of Disaster Management and Resiliency inside HUD. Previously, Congress had to write new rules for CDBG-DR from scratch after every disaster — a process that has historically taken months to years to get money moving after floods like the one that hit Kerr County on July 4, 2025. A standing program with standing rules could mean faster turnaround the next time, and could shape how the county’s current recovery dollars are administered going forward. Worth a call to the county’s disaster recovery coordinators to ask whether this changes anything already in motion.

2. A repair program built for exactly the gap Kerr County has

A new pilot program funds comprehensive home repairs for low-income owners of single-family, inherited, or manufactured homes, plus small landlords whose properties serve as affordable housing — specifically for repair costs not covered by other federal programs. That “not covered by other programs” language matters: it’s aimed at the same gap where flood-damaged homes here have fallen through the cracks between FEMA, insurance and other aid.

3. Cheaper manufactured housing

For 50 years, federal law has required manufactured homes to sit on a permanent chassis — a base with wheels — even though almost none of them are ever moved again after installation. The new law drops that requirement, which the Bipartisan Policy Center estimates could cut $5,000 to $10,000 off the cost of a new manufactured home. Given how much of the Hill Country’s affordable housing stock is manufactured or mobile homes, that’s a real number for local buyers and for flood-displaced families rebuilding.

4. Grants aimed at manufactured home communities

A separate provision, the PRICE Act, funds grants to manufactured housing communities for preserving affordability, fixing infrastructure and creating new homeownership opportunities. Any mobile home parks in the county — and there are several — would be eligible to apply once HUD stands up the program.

5. USDA rural housing reforms

The law reforms USDA’s Rural Housing Service, including decoupling rental assistance from maturing mortgages, so rural tenants don’t lose assistance once a property’s federal mortgage is paid off, and making it easier for nonprofits to acquire aging Section 515 rural rental properties..

6. A pilot for small-dollar mortgages

The bill authorizes a pilot program for mortgages with original principal balances of $100,000 or less — loans conventional lenders often won’t originate because the profit margin is too thin, even in markets where home prices would otherwise support them. That’s directly relevant to the housing-price data The Lead has been building: if Kerr County listing prices have genuinely fallen enough from the 2023 peak to put homes in that price range, this pilot could determine whether buyers can actually get financed at that price point.

7. A guaranteed rural share of new design grants

A new grant program pays local governments to adopt pre-approved building designs — accessory dwelling units, duplexes, townhouses — to speed up permitting. Ten % of that funding is set aside specifically for rural areas. It’s a small guarantee, but it’s a guarantee, in a funding landscape where rural communities usually lose out to bigger cities on discretionary grants.

8. A new pot of money for jurisdictions that actually build

The bill creates a $200 million-a-year Innovation Fund, competitive grants for local governments that show measurable increases in housing supply through things like streamlined permitting or zoning changes. It’s the kind of program Kerrville could position itself for, depending on how its ongoing zoning and permitting debates shake out.

9. Limits on institutional single-family buyers

The law bars entities that own 350 or more single-family homes from buying more, with an exception for build-to-rent development. It’s a national provision more relevant to hot metro markets, but worth checking locally: if institutional buyers have been active in Kerr County’s post-flood resale market, this closes that door going forward, with existing purchases exempt.

10. More room for local banks to invest in housing

The law raises the cap on how much of their assets banks can allocate to community development investments, from 15 % to 20 %.