{"id":19492,"date":"2024-07-02T18:46:55","date_gmt":"2024-07-02T18:46:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/?p=19492"},"modified":"2024-07-02T18:51:52","modified_gmt":"2024-07-02T18:51:52","slug":"santa-fe-realtors-promote-diverse-housing-options-in-housing-strapped-region-2-3-2-2-3-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-3-3-2-3-2-2-2-2-2-2-4-2-4-2-2-3-2-4-2-2-3-2-2-2-2-3-3-2-2-3-2-2-2-3-2-3-2-2-2-2-3-3-2-2-2-3-2-2-27","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/homepage\/success-story\/ir-cfa0724","title":{"rendered":"Iowa REALTORS\u00ae Almost Use Advocacy Everywhere to Oppose Rent Control Measure\u2026 but Legislators Saw Reason, Rendering the Effort Unnecessary"},"content":{"rendered":"\"\"When a bill allowing local municipalities to implement rent control surfaced in the Iowa House, Iowa REALTORS\u00ae<\/sup> understood what was at stake.\u00a0 As housing experts, they knew that the perceived benefits of rent control are outweighed by its negative effects on housing affordability. So, they rallied allies in opposition and called on the REALTOR\u00ae<\/sup> Party for support.\u00a0 When House leadership learned that a Call For Action<\/a> was poised and ready to go, they reconsidered the bill \u2013 allowing it to die before it reached committee.\r\n\r\n\u201cWe look at all proposed housing legislation through a lens of its impact on affordability,\u201d says Government Affairs Director Greta Haas.\u00a0 \u201cThis is especially true at a time of rising home buying and rental costs, especially as those increases affect our seniors on fixed incomes.\u00a0 Also, so many REALTORS\u00ae<\/sup> are mom-and-pop rental property owners, so rent control measures would affect many of our members on the other side of the equation.\u201d\r\n\r\nThe brief but significant threat of House File 2221 happened very quickly and was over within the span of a week, she reports, noting that Iowa had a shortened session early in 2024, because of the election year.\u00a0 As soon as the bill dropped at the end of January, the REALTORS\u00ae<\/sup> began putting together a member-facing CFA.\u00a0 \u201cThis was a couple of days before our Hill Day, so we were primed to send our legislators a powerful, in-person message,\u201d says Haas.\r\n\r\nThe REALTORS\u00ae<\/sup> have the largest political action committee in the state, giving them the biggest possible presence on Hill Day.\u00a0 Says Haas, \u201cEvery legislator knows at least one REALTOR\u00ae<\/sup>, who functions as their go-to subject-matter expert.\u00a0 What\u2019s more, they know our ability to build coalitions and wield influence.\u00a0 That day, about two-thirds of the legislature heard directly from a REALTOR\u00ae<\/sup>, so our impact was clear.\u00a0 We let them know that REALTORS\u00ae<\/sup> are all in favor of making housing affordable \u2013 but that rent control is not the avenue to do so.\u201d\r\n\r\nWhen House leadership caught wind that a CFA was in the works, they came out of their chamber to plead with Haas and Iowa REALTORS\u00ae<\/sup>\u2019 contract lobbyist, Jen Kingland.\u00a0 \u201cPlease don\u2019t do this!\u00a0 We get it!\u00a0 It won\u2019t go to committee!\u201d they assured the team.\r\n\r\nThe victory was a relief, but Iowa REALTORS\u00ae<\/sup> isn\u2019t resting on its laurels.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019ve been working hard to identify bills that will increase inventory and lower costs, and we\u2019ll continue to oppose any that challenge affordability,\u201d says Haas. \u00a0Recently, they secured property tax relief for seniors and veterans in Iowa; they\u2019ve also worked with the state homebuilders association to pass legislation keeping down development costs for the consumer.\r\n\r\n\u201cWe\u2019re so thankful to the NAR team for their ability to get our message together so fast,\u201d notes Haas.\u00a0 She encourages other state and local GADs to leverage the REALTOR\u00ae<\/sup> Party\u2019s advocacy tools.\u00a0 \u201cThey make an impact in the advocacy space, amplifying your messaging so far beyond what you could otherwise do.\u00a0 You may be thinking you don\u2019t have the bandwidth to take it on, but once you make the call, they\u2019ll make it easy.\u00a0 You\u2019ll be glad you did.\u201d\r\n\r\nTo learn more about how Iowa REALTORS\u00ae <\/sup>is working to keep housing affordable, contact Government Affairs Director Greta Haas at greta@iowarealtors.com<\/a> or 715.308.1518.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The state association representing Iowa\u2019s REALTORS\u00ae knew that the negative effects of a proposed rent control bill could far outweigh the benefits. It opposed the legislation through strategic advocacy, ultimately succeeding when, on the brink of a Call For Action, the state legislature cried \u2018uncle.\u2019","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":19535,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,33,296],"tags":[26,524,1833],"class_list":["post-19492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-about-us","category-success-stories","category-success-story","tag-call-for-action","tag-iowa","tag-iowa-realtors"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/realtorparty.realtor\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}