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Free NAHB Handbook Offers Strategies to Counter Impact Fees
More local governments are turning to impact fees as a financing tool in the face of increased budgetary constraints and rising demand for services — and to avoid the political battles that come with tax increases.
Today, 39% of counties and 59% of communities with populations greater than 25,000 imposed some type of impact fee to finance their infrastructure.
As a tool to help home builders associations and members who are negotiating or fighting impact fees, NAHB has released the most recent update of the “Impact Fee Handbook,” available free on the NAHB Web site.
The 133-page resource, which can be downloaded in PDF format, offers new ways to analyze impact fee methodologies and ordinances, and highlights the most common mistakes after ordinances are passed.
“Impact Fee Handbook,” which was produced by NAHB in conjunction with the Development Planning and Finance Group (DPFG), also includes the latest economic and legal information and public affairs strategies that builders and developers can use to address the fees.
The handbook includes information about the latest legal cases impacting this financing tool, as well as current information on the economic consequences of the tool — including the fees’ impact on house prices and who ultimately pays them.
Additionally, NAHB’s impact fee handbook offers a step-by-step method of looking at impact fee technical studies that serve as the basis of the fee. The analysis covers the various technical issues that should be addressed in impact fee studies and points out common errors in impact fee calculations.
The handbook also covers alternatives financing methods that could be offered as solutions to local governments for use instead of impact fees.
Finally, the handbook provides a primer on public affairs strategies that work to defeat impact fee proposals as well as negotiating tactics when their passage seems inevitable.
To download “Impact Fees Handbook” in PDF format, click here.
For other impact fee and general infrastructure financing resource, visit www.nahb.org/infrastructurefinance.
For more information, e-mail Thais Austin at NAHB, or call her at 800-368-5242 x8343.
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