Monthly distress updates involving multifamily landlords that used “traveling” affordable housing tax credits seem to paint a picture of broad misuse of the credits.
But this Austin apartment trade is a reminder that not everyone was using Texas’ housing finance corporation program for its loophole.
San Antonio Alternative Housing Corporation offloaded Runnymede Apartments, at 1101 Rutland Drive, in December, according to a press release from Muskin Elam Group, which represented the seller. The buyer is New York-based Nuveen Global Investments, deed records show.
After buying the property in 2007, San Antonio Alternative Housing Corporation partnered with the Austin Housing Finance Corporation — crucially, the property it purchased is in Austin, the same municipality as the corporation — to issue $10.8 million in bonds to rehab the property.
The former owner got tax breaks in exchange for keeping rents affordable. Those credits were transferred to Nuveen.
The 252-unit apartment complex was built in 1972. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, but the property was last valued at $26.4 million by the local appraisal district, which works out to $104,642 per unit.
Tax benefits conferred by Texas housing finance corporations came under fire after reporting showed that apartment owners were partnering with affordable housing entities in far-flung counties to wipe their properties off of local tax rolls.
Lawmakers responded with a crackdown on these so-called “traveling” tax credits via House Bill 21, which passed in the summer of 2025. Affordable housing developers and advocates say it goes too far in its creation of new affordability requirements.
Investors’ discontent inspired a lawsuit against the new legislation, which has further divided Texas’ affordable housing development community. Some critics of the law aren’t on board with the lawsuit, since it was filed by an investor that used the maligned loophole. The suit, filed in September in Cameron County, remains pending.
The fallout of HB 21’s passage is still ongoing. Some appraisal districts have taken the law as justification for denying property tax breaks for entities that used the loophole — even though the law appears to give them several years to come into compliance with new requirements.
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