A progress report released last week shows that Los Angeles's Citywide Housing Incentive Program has spurred proposals for 28,526 new housing units in its first year of operation. City officials describe CHIP as one of the "most significant" housing policy reforms enacted in Los Angeles in decades. The program, which launched in February 2025, created zoning capacity for more than 500,000 potential housing units citywide while streamlining approval pathways for residential projects.

The first-year results show 242 proposed developments moving through the system, with more than half already advancing into formal review channels. Of those projects, 117 received signed Preliminary Application Referrals, 89 moved to formal planning cases, and 25 received signed determinations. More than 38 percent of the proposed units are designated as covenanted affordable housing—a four-percentage-point jump from the program's initial six-month period. The report found that 57 percent of all proposed units are located in Higher Opportunity Areas, while 44 percent of affordable units are concentrated in those neighborhoods. More than 90 percent of applications qualified for ministerial processing, with 35 percent handled over the counter through zoning review procedures.

"The number of proposed projects has doubled since the first six months, indicating continued interest in the program," the report states. CHIP's first-year performance substantially exceeded other major Los Angeles housing initiatives: it generated nearly three times the 10,151 units proposed through Mayor Karen Bass's Executive Directive 1 program and outpaced the approximately 9,479 units proposed through Transit Oriented Communities entitlements during a comparable period. According to the report, development activity has expanded beyond traditional affordable housing hotspots like Westlake and Wilshire, with CHIP projects now appearing across Central Los Angeles, West Los Angeles, South Los Angeles, and the San Fernando Valley.

The program combines three housing development tools—the State Density Bonus Program, the Mixed Income Incentive Program, and the Affordable Housing Incentive Program—to offer developers incentives and expedited approval processes in exchange for providing affordable housing and locating projects near transit, employment centers, and designated opportunity areas. City planners say the geographic expansion suggests that the ordinance is helping unlock housing opportunities in areas where zoning restrictions historically limited multifamily development. Streamlined approvals are designed to reduce entitlement timelines and give developers greater certainty when pursuing multifamily projects—a shift that appears to be driving the momentum, as project proposals doubled between the program's first and second six-month periods. The trend indicates that Los Angeles may be breaking through longstanding regulatory barriers that kept denser housing out of neighborhoods with access to jobs, transit, and services.