Why It Matters
A new University of Virginia study suggests that housing affordability policy in Virginia and across the country may carry consequences beyond household finances — including shaping who shows up to vote. As Virginia’s governor navigates a legislative agenda that includes housing measures, the research adds an evidence-based dimension to ongoing debates about how economic policy and democratic participation intersect.
What Happened
UVA professor W. Ben McCartney and co-authors from the University of Southern California, the University of Oregon, and the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas published findings connecting mortgage relief to voter participation. The study, titled “Mortgage Refinancing and Political Participation,” examined homeowners who refinanced their mortgages during the Great Recession and tracked whether they voted in the 2012 presidential election.
The researchers linked mortgage records for millions of Americans with voter file data to conduct the analysis. Their core finding: homeowners who refinanced were more likely to cast ballots in 2012 than comparable homeowners who did not refinance.
The program at the center of the study was the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP), a federal initiative that allowed qualifying borrowers to secure new mortgage terms at lower interest rates following the 2008 banking and housing crisis.
“Policies that relieve financial distress may not only improve household finances,” McCartney said in public remarks on the research. “They may also change whether people feel able and willing to engage with democracy.”
By the Numbers
- 18 years have passed since the Great Recession that prompted HARP
- 2012 was the presidential election year examined in the study
- 200,000: the minimum affordable rental unit shortage Virginia documented in a 2021 state housing report
- 2020–2021: the period when many homebuyers locked in historically low mortgage interest rates — a variable the research team plans to examine next
Who Was Most Affected
The boost in civic participation was not uniform across political groups. McCartney noted that “the effect was especially strong among independent and unaffiliated voters,” suggesting financial relief may be a particularly influential factor for those without strong partisan motivation to participate.
The research also noted that younger voters — those between 18 and 34 years old — frequently cite housing affordability as a top concern. If financial stability correlates with civic engagement, sustained housing cost burdens on that demographic could have long-term implications for turnout patterns.
Virginia’s Housing Landscape
Virginia has wrestled with affordability challenges for several years. A 2021 state report identified a shortage of at least 200,000 affordable rental units, and found that fewer residents could afford to purchase homes compared to prior years. State lawmakers responded with a series of measures aimed at expanding housing supply and improving conditions for both renters and homeowners.
At the federal level, Congress passed a bipartisan housing package that incorporated proposals previously introduced or piloted in states including Virginia. The passage of that legislation marked one of the more broadly supported federal housing efforts in recent years.
Zoom Out
The findings arrive as housing affordability has become a national policy priority. The study’s implications extend well beyond Virginia — any jurisdiction deploying financial relief tools for homeowners or renters could, according to this research, be indirectly influencing future election participation rates.
That dynamic adds a new variable to discussions about program design and targeting. Election integrity and voter participation debates continue across Virginia and neighboring states, though those conversations have largely focused on election administration rather than economic preconditions for civic engagement.
What’s Next
McCartney and his team at UVA’s Household and Urban Finance Lab plan to extend this line of inquiry in two directions. First, they intend to examine how federally designated Opportunity Zones may shape political behavior in affected communities. Second, they will study whether the large cohort of homebuyers who locked in low mortgage rates in 2020 and 2021 — and who are now effectively unable to move without accepting significantly higher rates — show distinct patterns of political engagement compared to less financially constrained homeowners.