The RESIDE Act, explained and which empty offices it could turn into homes
The RESIDE Act is a federal grant program for converting vacant commercial buildings into affordable housing. It became law on July 11, 2026, as Section 210 of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act. HUD awards the grants to states and cities, up to $10 million per project, not to developers.
The bill text says who gets the money. It cannot say which buildings the money would actually convert. This site works that out building by building, starting with Downtown San José, where 18 buildings and 2,452 homes depend on the grant.
The RESIDE Act at a glance
- Full name
- Revitalizing Empty Structures Into Desirable Environments Act.
- Status
- Law. Enacted July 11, 2026, as Section 210 of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act (H.R. 6644). First introduced on its own as H.R. 5591.
- What it funds
- Competitive HUD grants to convert vacant commercial and industrial buildings, such as empty offices, into affordable housing.
- Who can apply
- States and local governments that receive HOME Investment Partnerships funds. Developers and building owners cannot apply directly.
- Grant size
- Up to $10 million per award.
- Total funding
- Up to $100 million a year in fiscal years 2027 through 2031, but only out of HOME appropriations above $1.35 billion. In a year Congress funds HOME at or below that line, the program gets nothing.
- Priority areas
- Opportunity Zones and economically distressed areas.
- Can anyone apply yet?
- Not yet. As of September 12, 2026, HUD has not published a Notice of Funding Availability.
From the enacted text and the Congressional Research Service summary. What the Act funds, in detail · Sources
Why most empty offices never become homes
Cities have published vacancy reports for years, and conversions still rarely happen. The limit is the building. Apartments need windows, and a deep office floor leaves a dark core that has to be gutted, braced and sprinklered but can never be rented. After that, the numbers still have to work.
Of the 99 commercial buildings at least 60 feet tall in Downtown San José, 19 pencil for housing with no subsidy. 18 more, holding 2,452 homes, pencil only with a RESIDE Act grant. The other 62 do not pencil even with one, at default assumptions. That middle group is what the program is for.
A high score means a building is worth a professional feasibility study, never that it is convertible. The model screens geometry from footprints; it cannot see interior cores, columns, ceiling heights or post-tension slabs, and it does not know which buildings are vacant. Each district page states its limits in full.