Resilience

Extreme weather is changing how we think about affordable housing — creating new urgency and opportunities to build stronger, more resilient homes and communities that prevent displacement and preserve long-term affordability.

In 2025, U.S. disasters caused $115 billion in damages, driving up insurance premiums and shrinking coverage where it’s needed most. At the same time, growing risks are fueling innovation — accelerating solutions that help communities prepare, adapt, and recover.

More than 20 years ago, we created and launched the nation’s only green building program designed specifically for affordable housing. Since then, we’ve translated decades of best practices into practical strategies that communities across the country use to strengthen resilience before and after disasters.

Today, we’re building on that leadership — bringing together partners across health, energy, climate, and housing to make healthy, resilient, and energy-efficient affordable homes the expectation, not the exception.

4.2M tons of CO₂

emissions prevented by Enterprise Green Communities-certified homes

$332M

in all-time utility (energy and water) savings

Building Resilient Futures

Our Building Resilient Futures team advances green building, energy efficiency, climate resilience, and healthy environments so communities can respond to today’s challenges and prepare for what’s ahead. As the only national nonprofit that brings together solutions, capital, and community development under one roof, we are uniquely positioned to drive this holistic, collaborative approach forward.

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Green Communities

Enterprise Green Communities is the nation’s most widely adopted green building framework and the leading standard used by Low-Income Housing Tax Credit programs. Today, 29 states — along with Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, Chicago, and New York — require or incentive Green Communities certification.

Across 44 states, over 241,000 affordable homes have been certified to Green Communities, delivering healthier, more resilient, and more energy-efficient homes.

See how Enterprise Green Communities can support your affordable housing goals.

Explore Green Communities

Through our partnership with Enterprise, affordable housing developments all across the country can attain dual certification under Green Communities Criteria and WELL, which helps ensure this critical sector has the opportunity to take the lead on both sustainability and health.

Rachel Hodgdon, President & CEO, IWBI 

Reduce Risk

We’ve transformed decades of best practices into actionable strategies that communities across the country are using to prepare for, withstand, and recover from natural disasters.

Join the more than 150 multifamily affordable housing professionals who have participated in our Resilience Academies. These regional cohorts are tailored to the unique hazards faced by different communities across the country.

You can also explore our Climate Risk Reduction Resource Hub, which provides a collection of climate risk reduction tools that are helping affordable housing developers, owners, and operators make their properties more resilient.

Learn more

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Climate Resilience Academies

Our cohort-based training academies offer tools and strategies to owners and operators who want to make their properties more resilient to environmental risks.

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Equitable Decarbonization

We've partnered with RMI and Housing Partnership Network to launch the Affordable Housing Decarbonization Hub. This industry-leading resource is designed to support the transition to more efficient, climate-ready multifamily homes. The hub has everything you need all in one place, from a comprehensive knowledge library to real-time updates, and even access to a decarbonization expert who can answer your questions.

Learn more about our decarbonization efforts.

Shaun Donovan, CEO and president, at a conference table with people seated in the background

ADVANCING THE FIELD

Advocating for Climate Resources

Our practice-informed guidance leverages more than four decades worth of successful advocacy at all levels of government. We are currently advocating for policies and building requirements that use forward-looking climate data to create comfortable, safe housing in the face of changing participation patterns, heat stressors, and more extreme weather events.

Learn more about our federal policy priorities, including advocating for the permanent authorization of the Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR).

Tall homes with solar panels on the roofs

50-50 background color

Deep Yellow

Featured Program

Powering a Housing Transformation

Power Forward Communities, the landmark coalition that Enterprise co-leads with some of the country’s most trusted community development, climate, and housing organizations, has been awarded a $2 billion National Clean Investment Fund grant to make America’s homes healthier, more resilient, and more affordable.

Learn more about this unprecedented effort to make potentially millions of American homes more energy efficient through programming and financial supports that lower housing costs and utility bills for families and communities across the United States.

Join us!

We have been leading the field in resilient solutions for affordable housing for more than two decades. Together, we can continue to push for solutions that meet the challenges of our changing climate.

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