Renaissance Philanthropy Launches Design Sprint for Housing Abundance Fund, with Support from The Prudential Foundation and Arnold Ventures
The effort will scope and catalyze early-stage, systems-level solutions to unlock housing supply.
WASHINGTON, DC — January 28, 2026 — Renaissance Philanthropy today announced the launch of a new body of work focused on addressing the United States’ housing supply shortage—one of the most pressing economic and social challenges facing the country. The effort is enabled by support from The Prudential Foundation and Arnold Ventures and will focus initially on scoping and designing a philanthropic fund to accelerate scalable, non-incremental solutions that increase housing supply and affordability.
This initial scoping effort will focus on identifying high-impact opportunities to deploy philanthropic capital into early-stage solutions that address key bottlenecks constraining housing production—including zoning and permitting barriers, capital availability, outdated business models, and limited adoption of technology across the housing value chain. In addition to early-stage technology solutions, the scoping effort will also surface promising alternative homeownership models and financing mechanisms, including, but not limited to community land trusts, accessory dwelling units, micro-homes, co-housing, and shared equity ownership models. The work will lay the foundation for a potential new philanthropic investment platform designed to catalyze systems-level change at scale.
“The housing affordability crisis is fundamentally a housing supply problem, and incremental fixes are not enough,” said Kumar Garg, President of Renaissance Philanthropy. “We need to take a portfolio approach to innovation—backing new technologies, business models, and policy-enabling tools that can unlock supply at scale. This work is about building the connective tissue between innovators, policymakers, and capital so promising ideas don’t stall before reaching impact.”
The initiative will be led by Matt Hoffman, Fellow at Renaissance Philanthropy with more than two decades of experience spanning housing development, finance, policy, and innovation. Hoffman will guide the scoping effort, drawing on insights from industry leaders, entrepreneurs, policymakers, and funders to identify where targeted philanthropic capital can most effectively accelerate change.
The Prudential Foundation and Arnold Ventures are supporting the initiative as part of their broader commitments to expanding access to affordable housing and strengthening economic opportunity.
“At Prudential, we view homeownership as a cornerstone of wealth building and economic security,” said Paula D'Ambrosa, Director of Inclusive Solutions at Prudential Financial. “Through this grant, we’re strengthening our efforts to expand access to affordable homeownership and scale innovative solutions that can transform the market—creating lasting value for families and communities nationwide.
“Housing costs are high because we don’t build enough homes, especially in places where demand is strongest,” said Jenny Schuetz, Vice President of Infrastructure, Housing at Arnold Ventures. “This initiative is an opportunity to connect policy reform with practical tools and new business models that can actually change outcomes on the ground. Philanthropy has a critical role to play in helping these ideas get off the ground and reach scale.”
A core focus of the work will be exploring the design of a potential Housing Abundance Fund—a proposed, non-dilutive philanthropic fund intended to support early-stage ventures and initiatives that can unlock housing supply nationwide. The concept is grounded in several key insights: there are no silver bullets to increasing supply; the housing production system is fragmented and under-digitized; and many promising solutions struggle to scale because they fall outside traditional venture capital or public funding models.
In addition to supporting new ventures, the work will explore mechanisms to connect innovators with state and local policymakers—who control many of the rules governing housing production—to speed adoption and replication of effective solutions.
Renaissance Philanthropy designs, incubates and launches ambitious time-bound, thesis-driven philanthropic funds that accelerate progress on complex, system-wide challenges. Recent programs and funds have focused on areas such as education, artificial intelligence, and climate and energy innovation. This new housing-focused work builds on that model, applying it to a sector widely recognized as essential to economic growth, opportunity, and stability.
“This is a moment that calls for bold experimentation,” Garg added. “We have the knowledge, the talent, and the capital in this country to solve our housing shortage—but only if we rethink how those pieces come together. Our goal is to help create the conditions for housing abundance, not scarcity, in communities across the United States.”
About Renaissance Philanthropy
Renaissance Philanthropy is a non-profit focused on enabling ambitious science, technology, and innovation. The organization builds time-bound, thesis-driven philanthropic funds to support ideas that advance entire fields forward. Renaissance Philanthropy has a proven track record of partnerships with global funders and organizations across the private and public sectors. In the first year, it has catalyzed $214M for science, innovation, and technology, including $52M in funding raised for initiatives housed at Renaissance Philanthropy and $162M of funding unlocked directly for other organizations.
About The Prudential Foundation
Established in 1978, The Prudential Foundation has provided grants totaling over $1 billion in support of Prudential Financial’s purpose of making lives better by solving the financial challenges of our changing world. By collaborating with nonprofit organizations that help strengthen neighborhoods, address barriers to economic equality, and create new paths to financial security, The Prudential Foundation is committed to accelerating economic mobility for communities in the U.S. and around the world.
About Arnold Ventures
Arnold Ventures is a philanthropy that supports research to understand the root causes of America’s most persistent and pressing problems, as well as evidence-based solutions to address them. By focusing on systemic change and bipartisan policy reforms, AV works to improve the lives of American families, strengthen communities, and promote economic opportunity.
For more information, please contact media@renphil.org.