Vermont Issues Missing Middle Housing Toolkit

A new ‘Homes for All Toolkit’ released in March by the Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development aims to streamline and clarify the development process for missing middle housing. Amy Love Tomasso describes the toolkit for Congress for New Urbanism.

The document provides a guide for small-scale builders and community leaders, highlighting the benefits of small and mid-sized multifamily housing projects.“These home types, which include accessory dwelling units (ADUs), duplexes, small-scale multi-household buildings, and neighborhood-scale mixed-use/live-work buildings, are rooted in Vermont’s traditional development pattern and the New England vernacular style.” Yet over the last century, these traditional housing types have been legislated out of existence.

According to Tomasso, the toolkit “is the start of a movement to bring missing middle housing back to Vermont communities, an opportunity to grow a new generation of developers who value ‘return on community’ as much as return on investment.” 

The state plans to pre-approve plans for four different missing middle housing types to make permitting and building easier and more affordable. While cities like Los Angeles have done this at the local scale, Vermont would be the first to issue a statewide pre-approved plan set.