City of Detroit aims to be build 1,000 new houses by 2031 in new program

For Daniel Washington, vacant land in Detroit's Northwest Goldberg neighborhood has already become part of its transformation.

In 2025, his team at Northwest Goldberg Cares began turning vacant lots into community spaces, including Retro Play Park. Now, the city wants to turn more vacant land into homes.

"Excitement, excitement, skepticism, but excitement. And when I say skepticism, I just mean how we're going to get there, and I think that today answered a lot of questions for us," said Washington.

The city says 84 new units in one- to four-family buildings were produced in 2024 and 114 in 2025. With the goal of building 1,000 new homes by 2031, Detroit wants the capacity to produce about 250 homes per year to meet the new target on time.

While the plan includes changing zoning rules for smaller lots, creating pre-approved home designs to speed up permitting, and bundling city-owned lots for development, those updates still need approval.

"I will say overall, our goal is to try to keep these homes as affordable as possible for everyday Detroiters and families in Detroit. And you also have an administration whose focus is to empower people," said Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield.

Washington says whether that development benefits the people already here will depend in part on how much they're included in what comes next.

For residents, the first test of the city's ambitious timeline is whether it can actually remove the delays that have slowed construction.

"I think first and foremost is the infrastructure of it all, and I think that that's what about this program is about. It's about the red tape. It's about the infrastructure to be able to support that type of speed and scale that's needed," said Washington.

One way the city wants to cut that red tape is by changing the rules for how much land is needed to build.

"We are walking away from that suburban model and going back to an urban model. This will allow developers not only to have a shortened approval process, but they will have a decrease really in their costs," said Marcell Todd, director of the Detroit City Planning Commission.

Those zoning changes go before the City Planning Commission No. 5 and would still need City Council approval.