Washington, D.C. —In response to news that industry lobbying groups, including the National Association of Home Builders, are now opposing Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Tim Scott’s bipartisan ROAD to Housing Act over a single section that would require “built-to-rent” houses to be sold to individuals within seven years after construction, the American Economic Liberties Project released the following statement.

“It is ironic—and telling—that the same voices who downplayed build-to-rent and institutional investors generally as a tiny slice of the housing industry are now willing to tank the most promising comprehensive legislation to tackle America’s housing crisis in a generation over a targeted provision that does not even fully ban that business model,” said Laurel Kilgour, Research Manager at the American Economic Liberties Project. “Creating a gaping loophole for build-to-rent would make home ownership off-limits in entire neighborhoods, while exposing more renters to powerful landlords with a track record of price-gouging and deceptive practices.”

“Moreover, the notion that houses built-for-rent would never otherwise be built is simply lobbyist propaganda. In fact, this category of construction barely existed before the pandemic, and the ROAD to Housing Act unlocks many other avenues to increase housing supply,” added Kilgour. “Big builders and their proxies are just upset they would not be able to cash in as handsomely on the massive land hoarding that enabled them to pace production and cater to single-family rental landlords at scale instead of selling quickly to ordinary families.”

As Economic Liberties identified in its November 2025 whitepaper “Capital Crunch,” the disappearance of reliable financing for neighborhood homebuilders—and Wall Street’s reorientation of surviving large homebuilders towards maximizing margins, and away from abundant production—is the primary cause of America’s insufficient supply of single-family homes for sale.

But institutional investors’ increasing activity in the single-family home (SFR) market is also a serious concern for Americans’ homeownership prospects in some areas—while also subjecting renters to landlords who are often repeat bad actors. The share of home purchases made by institutional investors has surged 900% from 2012 to 2022, from about 40,000 to 415,000. Although institutional investors own only a small percentage of SFR homes nationwide, there are at least a dozen cities where they command double-digit market shares, including Atlanta, Indianapolis, Raleigh, and Tampa. As Economic Liberties laid out in a recent fact sheet, these trends are in part due to the fact that single-family homes are increasingly “built-for-rent,” or built for sale to institutional investors rather than individual homebuyers. Finally, in addition to restricting supply, institutional homeownership exposes renters to landlords who are more likely to hike rents, charge junk fees (as evidenced by the Federal Trade Commission’s 2024 case against Invitation Homes), and pursue aggressive evictions. And the same publicly-traded homebuilders that recently started catering to these landlords have themselves been accused of cutting corners and “shoddy workmanship” in their construction.

In addition to requiring “built-to-rent” houses to be sold to individuals within seven years after the date of purchase and otherwise banning institutional investors (defined to include entities with over 350 homes) from buying more single-family homes, the ROAD to Housing Act would streamline federal permitting requirements (and exempt some infill housing developments altogether), authorize new grant programs for cities to construct affordable housing, and direct federal agencies to make regulatory changes to encourage more affordable manufactured and modular housing.

Reportedly, 32 out of 42 industry groups that signed the letter opposing the ROAD to Housing Act are “affiliated with the YIMBY Action network.”

Read “Capital Crunch: How the Fall of Local Finance and the Rise of Shareholder Primacy Warped Single-Family Homebuilding in America — And What to Do About It,” here.

Read “Fact Sheet: How Build-To-Rent Homes Limit Single-Family Home Supply and Squeeze Affordability,” here.

Learn more about Economic Liberties here.

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The American Economic Liberties Project works to ensure America’s system of commerce is structured to advance, rather than undermine, economic liberty, fair commerce, and a secure, inclusive democracy. Economic Liberties believes true economic liberty means entrepreneurs and businesses large and small succeed on the merits of their ideas and hard work; commerce empowers consumers, workers, farmers, and engineers instead of subjecting them to discrimination and abuse from financiers and monopolists; international trade arrangements that promote balanced trade and benefit workers, farmers and small businesses; and wealth is broadly distributed to support equitable political power.