The apartments were falling apart. The residents were fighting to stay.
That’s what Mayor Paul Young remembers most about Tillman Cove, a 97-unit Memphis apartment complex where residents faced eviction shortly after he became the city’s housing director in 2016.
“They were in terrible shape. Terrible shape,” Young recalled Thursday, Oct. 15,, at the Memphis Housing Summit, held at the Memphis Botanic Garden. “But they were crying to be there, because they had nowhere else to go.”
It was a painful introduction to the complexities of Memphis’ housing crisis: Even substandard housing can be too precious to lose when the alternatives are few — or unaffordable.
“That was 2016,” Young said. “It’s happening in 2026. And the question that’s before us is, ‘what are we gonna do?’”
But as the summit made clear, building more homes is only part of the equation. Making them affordable — to build, buy, rent and maintain — is another challenge altogether.
The numbers behind the crisis
The numbers presented Thursday help explain why the desperation Young witnessed at Tillman Cove remains familiar a decade later.
According to findings from the forthcoming 2026 State of Memphis Housing Report presented by Jessica Lotz of Innovate Memphis, approximately 37,000 households earning no more than 30% of area median income are competing for just 8,500 housing units that are affordable and available to them.
And the affordability gap is widening. Between 2019 and 2024, Memphis home values climbed 81% and rents rose 37%, while household incomes increased just 20%, according to the report.
Meanwhile, even though Memphis has lost roughly 35,000 residents since 2010, the number of households has grown. More people are living alone or in smaller households, changing the kinds of housing the city needs.
The existing housing stock presents another challenge: Nearly 80% of Memphis’ single-family homes are at least 50 years old, creating costly maintenance and rehabilitation needs for homeowners who may already be struggling to make ends meet.
Taken together, the findings suggest that Memphis faces more than a housing shortage. It needs homes that match residents’ incomes, household sizes and neighborhoods — while preserving the housing people already have.
Closing the gap
For Young, the answer begins with a goal: 10,000 housing units built or rehabilitated by December 2030. That includes affordable and market-rate housing, single-family homes and multifamily developments across the city.
At Thursday’s summit, Young reported that 3,339 units — including newly constructed and rehabilitated housing across price ranges — have been completed since January 2024, leaving 6,661 to go.
“I’ve heard the criticism online,” Young said. “‘The mayor put out this 10,000 housing unit (goal), but they didn’t have a plan.’ Yes, we do. We do have a plan.”
Young outlined a three-part strategy:
- Streamlining policies and development regulations that make housing difficult to build;
- Expanding financing tools, including the city’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund and incentives for middle-income housing; and
- Developing the local contractors and developers needed to get the work done.
The city is also working to put publicly owned land back into productive use, including approximately 200 parcels in Hyde Park that Shelby County is transferring to Memphis for housing development.
But even with land, financing and willing builders, the numbers don’t always work.
Ralph Perrey, executive director of the Tennessee Housing Development Agency, described a problem familiar to developers working in some Memphis neighborhoods: A newly constructed house can cost substantially more to build than its eventual appraised value.
“We recognize that there are parts of town where what it costs you to build a new home is more than the finished product is going to appraise for,” Perrey said.
To address that problem, THDA has launched a development-gap pilot in Memphis, offering to cover the difference between construction costs and appraised values for qualifying projects.
“Build that home, sell it for what it appraises for, and if you’re $50,000, $60,000, $70,000 short, we will make up the difference,” Perrey said.
Perrey also outlined additional state support, including tax-credit awards expected to generate more than $30 million in equity for Memphis housing developments and eight tax-exempt bond awards associated with another $112 million in affordable housing construction and rehabilitation.
For prospective homebuyers, THDA recently added a down payment assistance option of up to $25,000 for newly built homes. A separate $20 million statewide workforce housing pilot is expected to launch in early 2027.
Still, Perrey warned that financial incentives alone cannot overcome local restrictions that limit what developers can build. Zoning, permitting and neighborhood opposition, he argued, can make it difficult, sometimes impossible, to create the kinds of housing communities need.
“We can only help you build what your community allows to be built. Happy people don’t go to public hearings,” he said, drawing knowing laughter from the audience.
Lessons from Philadelphia
Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker knows the challenges of ambitious housing goals. Her city’s H.O.M.E. initiative aims to create or preserve 30,000 housing units, confronting many of the same problems facing Memphis: aging homes, rising costs and the threat of displacement.
In an onstage conversation with Young, Parker emphasized that building new housing is only part of the solution. “The most affordable house you have is the one you currently live in,” she said.
That means helping longtime homeowners afford repairs, including seniors on fixed incomes and working families who earn too much to qualify for traditional assistance but not enough to maintain their homes.
Parker also emphasized the need to preserve existing neighborhoods as cities pursue new development. She praised Young for setting a measurable housing goal, even though publicly committing to a number creates an opportunity for critics to judge the administration’s progress.
Former HUD Secretary Fudge: ‘Just get louder’
Former U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge offered both encouragement and a challenge.
“We cannot continue to build our grandparents’ houses,” she said. “We just don’t live in that kinda country anymore.”
Fudge was urging housing advocates to embrace new construction methods and adapt to changing housing needs. But her argument for affordable housing was also deeply personal. Growing up in Cleveland, she said, her family didn’t have much money. What they did have was a place where relatives could always find shelter.
“I grew up as a kid that didn’t even know I was poor. Let me tell you why: ‘Cause I had a house. I had a roof over my head,” Fudge said.
“I lived in this big house, this two-family house, and on one side was my great-grandparents, my aunt and uncle, their six kids, my grandmother’s brother and whoever came from the South.
“On my side was my grandparents, my mother, my brother and I, my aunt, her three children and whoever came from the South. Anybody that came and needed help could stay at our house. And I never went a day without food. Every day I came home, I felt safe,” Fudge continued.
“And that is what we need to do for every child in this country — is to make sure when they come home, they feel safe.”
