Ensuring Renters Benefit from Energy Efficiency
In the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, multifamily buildings with five or more units account for up to 39 percent of total housing, more than 10 percent above the national average, and provide homes to millions of residents. This scale and density make the sector a critical component of regional, state, and local strategies for energy efficiency, energy affordability, healthy housing, and greenhouse gas emissions reductions. Large and mid-size multifamily buildings are common in the Northeast, with 32 percent of rental units located in buildings with at least 20 apartments. Given this market share, the multifamily sector presents a major opportunity to improve building performance while preserving affordable housing and enhancing residents’ quality of life.
The Challenge of Scale and Age
The scale and age of the region’s multifamily housing stock complicate efforts to improve energy efficiency. Nationally, around 55 percent of small and medium multifamily properties were built before 1980. In cities like Philadelphia, where multifamily buildings constitute 42 percent of the rental market, the share of single- and multi-family residential units constructed before 1980 is as high as 88 percent. Upgrades in older buildings are complicated by hazards like mold and asbestos, outdated electrical systems, and costly structural repairs. These conditions contribute to high energy burdens and persistent health and safety risks for residents.
Centering Equity
These challenges disproportionately impact low- to moderate-income communities, who are more likely to live in older buildings. Without safeguards, retrofitting these buildings can increase the risk of post-upgrade displacement through rent increases and property sales. As a result, well-intentioned rehabilitation projects can threaten the availability of affordable housing for vulnerable populations including older adults, persons with disabilities, working-class households, and immigrant and new American communities that rely on low-barrier affordable rental housing.
NEEP’s Strategic Response
NEEP’s multifamily initiative aligns energy affordability, housing stability, public health, and climate action into a single, coordinated strategy. To advance this strategy, NEEP convenes and supports key stakeholders, including state energy offices, local governments, utilities, housing providers, community development agencies, and more to advance practical, scalable solutions.
The initiative focuses on four core areas:
- Mapping and facilitating access to financing streams for energy efficiency upgrades
- Research and resources to inform policy and program design
- Promoting proven retrofit models and best practices for program implementation
- Project management and technical assistance to scale effective program models
NEEP Multifamily Resources
To support practitioners in the region, NEEP develops resources that inform program design and implementation strategies and approaches to program delivery. These tools can help stakeholders as they seek to improve energy efficiency in multifamily properties in ways that reflect real-world building conditions and the specific needs of multifamily building owners and residents.
Multifamily Blog Posts
- Equitable Decarbonization in the Affordable Multifamily Sector
- The Problem in Multifamily Energy Data Access
- Decarbonizing Multifamily Affordable Housing with Networked Geothermal in Connecticut
- LIHTC Expansion: An Opportunity for Energy Efficiency in Affordable Housing
Multifamily Retrofit Case Study Database
The Multifamily Retrofit Case Study Database is a sortable catalog of energy efficiency retrofit projects in multifamily buildings in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic regions. This tool can help program administrators, architects, contractors, housing developers, state and local governments, community stakeholders, and others identify actionable, real-world strategies for multifamily energy efficiency retrofits. The Database also highlights opportunities for further research, particularly regarding post-intervention performance data.
