North Carolina is one of the fastest growing states in the country. World-class universities, expansive state parks, proximity to an international airport, the beach, the mountains, and that sweet southern charm are big draws for the Tar Heel State. According to the NC Chamber Foundation, the number of households in the state will increase by 218,160 between 2024 and 2029. The state needs a whopping 764,478 units, a mixture of for-sale and rental housing, to meet such high demand.
Durham County is one of the places facing down the massive influx of residents to the state. The report says that Durham ranks 4th in overall housing gap–the number of units needed to keep up with population growth–at 32,992 units, behind Mecklenburg, Wake and Guilford counties. Low-income homeowners and renters are feeling the pressures more acutely. According to the Triangle Community Foundation, Durham is short roughly 25,000 units for low-income and working class families.
There are many paths to reaching Durham’s housing goals, each with its own merits and shortcomings. Nearly every solution involves a combination of public and private sector contributions, and scales from accessory dwelling units and single family homes, to quadplexes and yes, even those gaudy high rises.
In 2019, Durham voters overwhelmingly supported a $95 million housing bond to facilitate the construction and restoration of hundreds of affordable housing units across the community. City officials also included $65 million in additional funding from the city’s Dedicated Housing Fund and federal dollars from the American Rescue Plan Act to round out the $160 million invested in a five-year affordable housing investment program, parts of which are still ongoing.
While the city has a strong grasp of the impact the housing program has made on units created by those funds, there is limited and scattershot data on the entire housing landscape in Durham. Private developers, local nonprofits and other organizations also play a role in increasing housing stock.
The City Has Spent Almost All of its 2019 Bond Funds
At the onset of the five-year affordable housing program, building new affordable housing units was a top priority. The city set a five-year goal of creating 1,600 new affordable rental units while also preserving 800 units. It exceeded both goals.
Almost $39 million went toward new construction and preservation, which allowed for the creation of 1,068 new affordable rental units using funds from the Forever Home bond and the Dedicated Housing Fund. Over half of those units were in partnership with the Durham Housing Authority, which rehabilitated its JJ Henderson and Morreene Road developments, as well as constructed new units at The Vanguard and The Joyce. DHIC and Self-Help also contributed to two major projects: Ashton Place, which supports senior living, and Hardee Street Apartments, a 132-unit apartment complex in East Durham. Residents have already begun to inhabit most of the properties.
A multitude of other projects are also under contract. In total, 1,169 rental units—917 affordable units and 252 market rate units—are in the midst of construction or rehabilitation, including phases 3 and 4 of the Southside projects near historic Hayti, more construction on the former Liberty Street Apartment site, and 20 accessory dwelling units as part of a pilot program with Coram Houses.
Lastly, over 500 affordable units are in the planning pipeline. The former Forest Hills Heights redevelopment is expected to create 185 units, and The Villages of Hayti would add 252 units, bringing much-needed housing to neighborhoods on the periphery of downtown. But these future projects come with a much higher price tag due to their prime location. The city has allocated roughly $46.8 million for the 571 units planned, more than it has already spent on the 1,608 built so far.
More units will likely be maintained through the city’s NOAH (naturally occurring affordable housing) preservation pilot program.
The city of Durham also surpassed other critical benchmarks by moving over 2,000 families into permanent housing, and helping roughly 4,700 low-income renters and homeowners continue to stay where they live through rental assistance and home improvement programs. The city fell short thus far in reaching its goal of providing financial support for low-income homebuyers; only 125 residents of the 400-person goal have taken advantage of the program. Although the city hit the five-year benchmark, some projects within Forever Home, Durham are still ongoing.
Durham is Part of a Growing Region
The story of Durham’s growth is no longer a best-kept secret. And for every accolade the city receives highlighting the Bull City as a “best place to live” with James Beard-winning restaurants, the cost of living has surged alongside them.
Since 2019, the area median income (AMI) at nearly all levels is up 36%. This measure is used to set price levels for affordable units—for example, units in one apartment complex may be set aside for residents making 80% of the area median income. When the AMI goes up, the price of units available to residents making a percentage of the AMI rise accordingly. While wages have increased, they haven’t kept up with housing prices and cost of goods, and recent cuts to federal programs like USAID and the potential loss of Medicaid expansion at the state level is putting added pressure on families from a wide swath of Durham.
But how does Durham’s affordability stack up against its peers?
According to the Durham Housing Dashboard, median home values in Minneapolis have grown $127,000 since 2014, reaching $322,000 a decade later. In half that time, Durham home values jumped $147,000, hitting over $400,000 in 2024. The sharp increase is due in part to Durham County’s property revaluation schedule. After completing the reappraisal process last year, the county commissioners opted to amend the schedule to conduct revaluations every four years (the state requires revaluations at least every eight years), in an effort to minimize the sticker shock that could come from long gaps between home appraisals.
Rental costs have also increased in Durham. Tenants are paying roughly $400 more per-month than they were in 2019. Many of those rental units are concentrated in the downtown area and often do not account for what housing advocates say is lacking in Durham: workforce housing and mid-density options like duplexes, known as missing middle housing.
Still, Durham boasts commendable stats in important categories. Durham has a high homeownership rate compared to other peer cities. At 55%, Durham outpaces Minneapolis, Ann Arbor, Portland, and Boston, which sits at just 35%.
Durham also has a relatively moderate housing cost burden to both homeowners and rental tenants, according to the Durham Housing Dashboard. Housing cost burden occurs when residents pay more than 30% of their incomes on housing costs. In Durham, 54% of homeowners with household incomes between $20,000 and $35,000 are considered cost-burdened, compared to 75% in Minneapolis, and 89% in Ann Arbor. At $50,000 to $75,000, 27% are cost-burdened in Durham; in Minneapolis, it’s 40%, and 54% in Portland.
The City Has Made Strides In Creating More Affordable Housing Through Private Partnerships
Veterans of the Monday city council meetings recognize a similar pattern of behavior. Private developers come before the dais to make their requests for an annexation or rezoning of property, and in return, the city council often rebuts with asks for affordable housing, either in the form of dedicated units set aside at a specific level of area median income, or contributions to the city’s dedicated housing fund.
City Council cannot require private developers to build affordable housing, per North Carolina general statute, but developers can offer to include affordable housing as a sign of good will, particularly if they are local or frequently bring cases inside City Hall. Developers can also take advantage of the city’s “density bonus” outlined in the unified development ordinance, which raises the number of units they can build in a certain zoning district, provided that at least 15% of the units are affordable (measured by AMI) for a minimum of at least 30 years.
Through these privately-initiated proffers, Durham signed off on 766 income-restricted units through approved development plans in 2025, a significant bump from the 297 approved in the previous year, according to data provided to the INDY by the city planning department. In addition, 474 additional affordable housing units were created through the density bonus, up from 74 units in 2024. As of 2025, the total number of units for each category is 2,177 and 898, respectively.
The UDO Rewrite Can Provide Options For Housing, But Won’t Solve The Affordability Crisis Alone
Housing advocacy in Durham is a dangerous pool to swim in. Sharks lurk in the waters of public discourse and online forums. The issue was at the forefront of local elections last fall, and continues to drive the conversation about Durham’s long-term sustainability.
If there’s one thing that both YIMBYs and NIMBYs can agree on, it’s that Durham needs more housing, at every level, for rent and homeownership. How we get there is where the battlelines are drawn, and one tool that folks believe is the skeleton key that unlocks their desired outcomes is the unified development ordinance (UDO).
Since Durham city councilors and county commissioners passed the Comprehensive Plan in 2023, the planning department has been grinding away at rewriting the UDO, the legislative tool that governs land use in Durham, to better align with the goals set forth by the comprehensive plan, which is the visioning document that lays out what Durham residents want their neighborhoods to look and feel like.
Proponents believe new zoning codes would give small, local developers more flexibility to fill gaps in the housing supply with accessory dwelling units, quadplexes and other housing types that national home builders tend to shy away from. The new housing stock would also increase the tax base across Durham, increasing property tax revenue for the city and county to use on essential services.
Skeptics see the UDO, and specifically upzoning, as a path for an already wealthy and powerful group (developers) to get rich quick while increasing the financial strain on Durham’s working class, and pressures on the environment. Skeptics also want to rein in development, which some say the city council has been too quick to approve, and give control back to residents, particularly on larger tracts of land like old shopping malls.
The planning department plans to finalize a full UDO draft by the spring, after which the document will undergo immense scrutiny from residents and council members. No matter what the final draft looks like, it will not be the silver bullet. While the increase in supply will have an effect on market competition, it will not automatically solve Durham’s affordability issues.
City and County officials have hinted at putting another housing bond on the ballot in the near future, and different leadership at the state and federal levels could provide additional funding sources, but local officials can’t afford to wait and see. They will have to make do with the resources available to them if they hope to make a dent in Durham’s housing shortfall.