CommunityScale

City & County of Honolulu Housing Plan

Client City & County of Honolulu Office of Housing, Hawaii
PartnerLevine Planning Strategies
ServicesHousing study, Dashboard
TimelineApril – October 2024
DeliverableHousing Plan

Launched in April 2024, CommunityScale and Abt Global are in the process of developing a Housing Plan for the City & County of Honolulu.

The plan focuses high density housing around the rail system on the southern side of the island with neighborhood-scale infill housing around the island’s other communities.
Land, especially land suitable for residential development, is scarce on the island.
Draft demand model that builds on the administration’s goal of producing 18,000 units over 8 years

Honolulu’s household population has grown modestly since 2010. In terms of relative income levels, most of the growth has been concentrated among households earning >140% AMI. Looking forward, the fastest growing household income group is >140% AMI, followed by the 80-100% AMI group. The ratio of households below 60% has been decreasing since 2013 and will not result in net new households if trends continue. However, households at lower levels of AMI are cost burdened and new affordable housing would address that need.

Stay tuned for more updates!

Jeff Sauser

Jeff Sauser, co-founding Principal at CommunityScale, has over 10 years experience leading urban design and planning projects for public and private sector clients in complex urban contexts across the country. His work emphasizes the role of housing policy and production in driving economic development progress and creating opportunities for socioeconomic mobility across the community. He is particularly interested in applying emerging big data resources and AI tools to help clients and communities plan smarter and more proactively.