Maine extends its affordable housing tax credit to 2036 and refills the rural programs
Governor Mills signed a ten-year extension of the Maine Affordable Housing Tax Credit, and April's supplemental budget put more than $30 million back into the Rural Rental and Affordable Homeownership programs that ran dry last summer. The housing bond, though, failed.
Two pieces of good news and one disappointment out of Augusta this spring:
- LD 2116 extends the Maine Affordable Housing Tax Credit through December 31, 2036, at $10 million a year. Since 2020 the credit has preserved 108 homes and built or put in the pipeline 824 more.
- The 2026 supplemental budget directs $37.5 million to new affordable housing, $11 million to eviction prevention and $2 million to aging in place, with more than $30 million going to the Rural Rental and Affordable Homeownership programs that were exhausted in June 2025.
- The proposed housing bond failed in the Legislature, along with the water and sewer bond.
For NHSH the practical effect is that the state's Rural Rental and homeownership subsidy programs are open again for the next round of South Shore Road homes.
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Summer Reception 2026: inside the two newest rentals at 217 Main Street
An open house at 217 Main Street, then cocktails at the Pingree Boathouse at Iron Point. The island got its first look at the two rental units opening by the end of the year.
Open house on Fish Hawk Road
Saturday, July 18, 4–6 p.m.: a walk through one of the two homes NHSH has built on Fish Hawk Road, the first of the South Shore Road homes.
Maine beat its 2025 housing production goal. Islands still need their own tools.
The state permitted 7,499 homes in 2025 against a 6,900 target. Only 13% were affordable, and the island-specific MaineHousing program that funded NHSH's rentals has had no new round since 2022.