Housing for the Elderly

HUD's Cost Containment Program Could Be More Effective Gao ID: RCED-86-106 September 9, 1986

In response to a congressional request, GAO: (1) reviewed the effectiveness of the Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) initiatives to control elderly housing program costs; (2) assessed whether additional opportunities existed for further cost control; and (3) identified the beneficiaries of the program.

GAO found that: (1) HUD projects, under its cost-containment initiatives, were more modest and had 16-percent lower average unit costs than projects built before HUD implemented the initiatives; (2) HUD would have needed $100 million more to fund the housing units in 1985 if it had not reduced its costs; (3) HUD could have further reduced its costs by requiring that the supplemental cost-containment provisions be applied to all projects, selecting projects with the most modest designs, and increasing the number of less-costly efficiency units in projects; and (4) the majority of the program beneficiaries were individuals who were single and who had very low incomes.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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