Low-Income Housing Trust Fund

The Chicago Low-Income Housing Trust Fund (CLIHTF) is a nonprofit organization incorporated in 1990 to manage rental assistance programs that address the housing needs of Chicago’s poorest residents; and is currently the largest City- and state-funded rental subsidy program in the U.S. Managed by a board of directors appointed by the mayor of Chicago and comprised of representatives of City government, nonprofit organizations and private corporations, the Trust Fund offers two foundational programs in the City of Chicago. The Rental Subsidy Program (RSP) provides unit-based subsidies to qualified apartment buildings in Chicago that dedicate a percentage of their building’s units to households with incomes less than 15% of the area median income (AMI), and a percentage for households with incomes between 15% and 30% AMI. The Multi-Year Affordability through Upfront Investment (MAUI) program provides forgivable construction grants or long-term operating reserve funds to property developers and owners that agree to offer affordable rental housing to households with incomes at or below 30% AMI.

The Trust Fund is best known for the Rental Subsidy Program (RSP), which is a unit-based subsidy offered to property owners that covers the cost difference between the rent that very low-income tenants can afford to pay and market rates. Rents are reduced for a specified number of units in a building, no more than 20% of the building’s total units, to a cost affordable to tenants with annual household incomes not exceeding 30% AMI. Both nonprofit and for-profit property owners can participate in the program, and eligible property types include single-family homes, two flats, multi-unit apartment buildings and single-room occupancy developments. As of 2026, the Trust Fund supported approximately 2,800 households – half of those being households earning less than 15% AMI and half being households with incomes between 15% and 30% AMI.

The Trust Fund also dedicates roughly 40% of its funding to Special Initiatives, created to assist targeted populations with strategic services linking social services to housing subsidies. In 2025, special initiatives included: the Homeless Dedicated Initiative, helping homeless individuals and families access and maintain permanent housing; Homeward Bound, focused on finding permanent housing for unsheltered homeless single adults; the HIV/AIDS Initiative, providing permanent housing and rental assistance to households living with HIV/AIDS; the Homeless Dedicated Prevention Initiative, assistance to households which are benefitting from expiring federal benefits; the Veterans Initiative, assisting U.S. veterans who are suffering from chronic homelessness; and Families First, providing permanent housing and support services to formerly homeless families. In 2025, 513 households were supported through these Special Initiatives.

The Trust Fund’s Multi-Year Affordability through Upfront Investment (MAUI) program receives the remainder of the Trust Fund’s resources. MAUI supports the development of new affordable rental housing by providing interest-free forgivable loans to replace up to 50% of a developer’s first private mortgage loan, where the savings in debt reduction are then used to provide rent reductions in up to 30% of the building’s units for households earning 30% AMI or less.