Comments on: A culture of greed tarnishes the Texas Low Income Housing Tax Credit program http://texashousers.net/2009/07/16/a-culture-of-unrestrained-greed-infects-the-texas-low-income-housing-tax-credit-program/ working together to make low-income housing and community development a priority in Texas Mon, 06 Feb 2012 09:24:50 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Government witness in Dallas corruption trial testifies he paid for community support for tax credit deal « Texas housers http://texashousers.net/2009/07/16/a-culture-of-unrestrained-greed-infects-the-texas-low-income-housing-tax-credit-program/#comment-1008 Wed, 12 Aug 2009 00:46:03 +0000 http://texashousers.net/?p=2323#comment-1008 [...] does not seem to have been bothered by the ethics of his actions. This is further proof of the “culture of greed” that I have blogged has infected some developers in the housing tax credit development industry in [...]

]]> By: John Henneberger http://texashousers.net/2009/07/16/a-culture-of-unrestrained-greed-infects-the-texas-low-income-housing-tax-credit-program/#comment-919 Fri, 17 Jul 2009 14:30:04 +0000 http://texashousers.net/?p=2323#comment-919 The need of some developers to develop too much, to fast, dominate in a market and always win out in the tax credit competition becomes a corrupting obsession, or as I call it, “the culture of unrestrained greed”. When a developer comes to live for the politics and the lucrative financial rewards of the “deal” and can’t balance that by spending at least as much time focused on conceiving, designing and developing better housing communities, they are infected with “unrestrained greed” and they are headed for trouble.

I made a point of recognizing that this malady does not effect most housing tax credit developers. That is testimony to the moral character of most in the business. The environment of the Texas tax credit program is an ideal incubator for the disease however, and unrestrained greed is contagious. Once a developer comes down with the disease then all of the others operating around the infected developer are in danger of catching it.

]]> By: Bob Voelker http://texashousers.net/2009/07/16/a-culture-of-unrestrained-greed-infects-the-texas-low-income-housing-tax-credit-program/#comment-917 Fri, 17 Jul 2009 12:26:05 +0000 http://texashousers.net/?p=2323#comment-917 You have the solutions right — but not sure about the greed issue. Sure, there are developers who do low income housing for wrong motives, but there are much easier ways to make money in real estate (at least in a good economy) and vast majority of LIHTC develpers have their hearts behind what they do. The real solution as you pont out is taking the institutionalized NIMBY factors out of the QAP — signs on property, public official support letters, neighborhood support letters, etc. But this means overcoming years of political institution of NIMBY’ism in TX and can only be done through the Fair Housing lawsuit filed against TDHCA — the politicians will never fix it on their own.

]]> By: FBI recordings show tax credit developer and indicted local officials discussed redirecting housing bonds away from the poor « Texas housers http://texashousers.net/2009/07/16/a-culture-of-unrestrained-greed-infects-the-texas-low-income-housing-tax-credit-program/#comment-914 Fri, 17 Jul 2009 06:08:20 +0000 http://texashousers.net/?p=2323#comment-914 [...] Yesterday I blogged that while a handful of local officials and housing developers may be sent to prison in the wake of the Dallas housing tax credit scandal, it is the culture of greed, the lack of real competition in the housing program and the flawed process of awarding housing tax credits that allowed corruption to take root. [...]

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