Frequently Asked Questions

The housing shortage crosses municipal boundaries and affects communities across the state, from large cities to small towns. While ensuring municipalities still have control over their zoning decisions, the state is taking action to mediate the patchwork of local zoning ordinances, signal reasonable and reliable permit and inspection review timelines, maintain transparent impact fees, and remove onerous regulatory barriers.

These reforms are informed by research and by policy approaches adopted in other states and communities to support housing production and improve long-term affordability.

The legislation is designed to reduce regulatory barriers that can increase development costs or delay projects—like discretionary approvals, burdensome parking mandates, owner-occupancy requirements for ADUs, and onerous impact fee negotiations—which often determine whether a housing project is financially feasible at all.

The State of Illinois is pairing this legislative agenda with $250 million in capital for infrastructure, middle housing development, and downpayment assistance to expand attainable housing opportunities for renters and homeowners across the state. Taken together, these legislative and capital components make Illinois a more attractive place for investment and housing development.

Yes. BUILD is designed not only to expand access to more attainable rental housing, but also to create new pathways to homeownership. By allowing the development of smaller multifamily buildings, the legislation supports more opportunities for condominium ownership—an important entry point for many first-time buyers. It also enables fee-simple homeownership by allowing land divisions of existing middle housing such as townhomes and cottage clusters, so that individual homes can be owned on their own lots rather than as part of a larger property.

The BUILD package aims to unlock more attainable starter homes for middle income and working families. It allows a single-family home by-right on lots of at least 2,500 square feet. It also introduces modest, by-right allowances for additional dwelling units on larger lots, with limits tied to lot size, helping expand housing and increase overall supply in existing residential neighborhoods.

Under the introduced version of BUILD, allowable unit counts are tied to lot size as follows:

Municipalities will retain flexibility to adopt clear and objective standards that shape development patterns, design, and neighborhood character, so long as those standards do not preclude or materially discourage the housing allowed under the Act.

The legislation establishes a framework of baseline "default" standards for lot coverage, FAR, and setbacks that apply only if a municipality does not update its zoning code within the required timeframe or adopts standards that conflict with the Act. These defaults are designed to function as a backstop, while encouraging municipalities to adopt tailored standards that reflect local context and design priorities within the framework of the Act.

Removing parking mandates is a proven policy approach that lets developers "right-size" parking based on market demand. This legislation follows the lead of multiple states (i.e., California, Connecticut, Florida, Maine, Vermont, and Washington) that are limiting mandatory parking minimums, which drive up housing costs, consume valuable land that could otherwise accommodate additional housing, and are often underutilized. By prioritizing people over parking, this legislation allows developers to match parking supply to actual demand, with standards they can exceed but are not required to.

The proposal enables modest increases in development while allowing municipalities to maintain key site controls for stormwater management. Municipalities may set standards such as lot coverage, provided those standards fall within an allowable range that ensures middle housing can still be built and is not precluded or materially discouraged in practice. All developments must continue to meet applicable local, state, and federal stormwater requirements, and municipalities retain full authority to enforce stormwater management, drainage, and engineering standards.

Yes. Any new development, whether it is an ADU or a new infill development, would still need to obtain approvals for water and sewer connections. This includes demonstrating that service can be extended in a way that meets local engineering standards, including easements, access, and constructability. Where it is not practical to extend service to a rear yard, or where doing so would be prohibitively expensive, the project is unlikely to move forward.

Local governments will still retain the ability to levy impact fees if they have the ability to do so already. The BUILD legislation only aims to enhance this process by increasing transparency and predictability for developers and aligning fees systematically to local needs.

This component of the legislation initiates a rulemaking process in which DCEO will work with outside researchers to develop a robust impact fee schedule. The schedule is expected to include formulas that account for regional differences in land and construction costs, student generation rates, household size, transportation impacts, and infrastructure demand. The Department will also issue adjustment factors for land value, infill development, higher-cost construction markets, and other key variables.

No. The third-party review reform is not designed to replace municipal permit reviewers or inspectors. It is intended to serve as a backstop when permit reviews or inspections exceed reasonable timelines. However, if that reasonable timeframe is exceeded, developers will have the opportunity to seek review from a qualified third party and the municipality must honor the assessment as if it were completed in-house, so long as the review demonstrates compliance with the applicable building codes.

By setting statewide expectations and offering third-party review as a backstop for inspection and permit review backlogs, Illinois can reduce avoidable delays and help advance needed housing development.

Single-stair reform allows the construction of new residential buildings up to six stories with only one exit stairway. Two stair requirements for small multifamily buildings increase construction costs and limit the range of housing sizes and floor plans, often limiting family-sized homes in mid-rise buildings.

Research and experience from other jurisdictions indicate that smaller residential buildings can be safely designed with a single stair when paired with modern fire-safety features such as sprinklers, fire-resistant construction, detection systems, and other code requirements. Many countries with strong fire safety records don't require two stairs, and cities like New York, Seattle, and Honolulu have safely allowed single-stair buildings for decades. Several states across the U.S. have also begun adopting similar reforms, including California, Colorado, Montana, Tennessee, Texas, and Washington.

Yes. The BUILD package includes $250 million in new capital funding to support middle housing development and homeownership. Of this total, $100 million will be allocated to a new targeted development fund administered by DCEO, providing grants to municipalities for below-ground infrastructure and site preparation costs that often prevent otherwise viable projects from moving forward. An additional $100 million will be administered by IHDA to support small and mid-sized developers in advancing middle housing projects in areas of need. The remaining $50 million will be used to recapitalize IHDA's existing down payment assistance programs, helping expand access to homeownership for first-time homebuyers.

Specific eligibility criteria and program structures will be developed through implementation. The goal is to design funding programs that unlock new housing opportunities, support attainable middle housing, and reflect community priorities such as affordability, geographic diversity, readiness, and impact.