Health Insurers Invest Billions in Affordable Housing Projects

Health care organizations across the country have poured billions into housing investments in recent years: In the past month, Kaiser Permanente and UnitedHealth Group both announced investments of over $100 million in affordable housing projects. Several health plans tell AIS Health that while they do expect a modest return on investment or reduction in costs from their efforts, they mostly see these expenditures as an act of altruism in line with their missions as stewards of public health.

According to the organizations themselves, total capital allocations to affordable housing investments by Kaiser Permanente, UnitedHealth Group and CVS Health Corp. amount to approximately $1.65 billion combined. A large portion of those funds are allocated to finance investments in affordable housing through the Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC), a financial instrument rolled out by the federal government in the late 1980s and early 1990s to encourage investment by the private sector in affordable housing.