Smaller households are more prevalent than ever, but most homes in the state are still designed for larger families.
A report from the Pioneer Institute suggests that while household sizes in Massachusetts are shrinking, the homes being built don't reflect this need for smaller housing units.
As Jennifer Smith notes in an article in News From The States, "In 2024, 63 percent of Massachusetts households had one or two people, but just 44 percent of occupied housing units had two or fewer bedrooms, according to the report."
According to report author Andrew Mikula, barriers to building smaller homes include a "cornucopia of regulations, and bureaucratic processes, and land values rising, and other trends that make it very difficult to build new homes that are small and low-cost in the same way that a ranch style home or bungalow would have been 50 years ago." Mikula is proposing a ballot measure that would prevent cities from imposing minimum lot sizes greater than 5,000 square feet or more than 50 feet of frontage for single-family homes.
As Smith explains, "The report offers a suite of policy recommendations to encourage more starter home construction, including, but going beyond, similar zoning changes to the ballot question. These range from zoning changes, to boosting the state’s accessory dwelling unit law, to allowing denser construction in certain areas."
Read the full story: New report urges state to think small on housing crisis
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