Historic Preservation for Housing
- Ken.Smith
- 5 days ago
- 6 min read
Updated: 3 days ago
By Ken Smith, Housing Policy Director
“To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child. For what is the worth of human life, unless it is woven into the life of our ancestors by the records of history?” -Marcus Tullius Cicero
Many of us Americans too often think “out with the old, in with the new.” However, when it comes to many of our older buildings, this notion can be mistaken. These buildings can actually help with our housing shortage!
Many older buildings were historically mixed-use, with shops on the ground level and at least one apartment above, often owned by the shopkeeper with the family living above. Other older buildings formerly used as factories or schools can often be great for “adaptive reuse” into apartment conversions. Let’s dive deeper!
The Aesthetic and Cultural Case for Preserving Old Buildings
Not every old building is historic or necessarily worthy of preservation, but a building or group of buildings can represent a historical period and aesthetic that would be difficult or impossible to replicate today due to the lack of trained craftsmen and access to or affordability of necessary materials.
For example, Milwaukee’s cream city bricks, which Tehila recently wrote about, have not been manufactured for more than 100 years. The loss of a historic structure is often irreplaceable. Historic buildings are often heritage sites, and they are most often what tourists are interested in seeing as well! Yet, there are practical reasons to retain older buildings.
Wisconsin examples of Cream City Brick.
Left to right: Pritzlaff Building (Milwaukee), Cathedral of St. John (Milwaukee), 203 S. Wacouta Ave. (Prairie du Chien)
The Fiscal and Physical Case for Preserving Old Buildings
Is that old, dilapidated building beyond saving? Much of the time it isn’t! While it may look ugly and beyond repair, the structure may still be structurally sound. Further, even if the structure needs work, it is often more cost-effective to repair the older building than the combined cost of demolition and new construction.
Many people criticize older buildings for their lack of energy efficiency. As an example, wood windows are often singled out. However, wood windows with exterior wood storm windows can be effective insulators, and their lifecycle cost is far cheaper than newer vinyl windows. Wood windows can last hundreds of years with proper occasional maintenance versus 20 to 30 years. More heat is typically lost from uninsulated walls and roofs than windows.
Further, for those concerned about climate change, Carl Elefante in Going for Zero:
Decarbonizing the Built Environment on the Path to Our Urban Future, argues that
“the greenest building is…one that is already built.”
The argument is premised upon the idea that the existing materials in a building have already been extracted or manufactured. Reusing as much as possible mitigates the need to burn more fossil fuels for the extraction of materials, manufacturing, and transportation of finished products.
Strong Towns UpZoned Podcast: Lessons from Buffalo: How to Stop Slumlords and Protect Urban Spaces
When is the old building really obsolete? |
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James Marston Fitch. Historic Preservation: Curatorial Management of the Built World (Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 1990), p. 69. |
Using Historic Structures for Housing
In 2025, approximately $8.64 billion in federal historic tax credits was spent in the United States to rehabilitate 10,390 housing units and create an additional 11,544 housing units. Of that sum, 11,582 housing units were for low- and moderate-income households.
19th Century stores with apartments or offices above in downtown Stevens Point
As previously mentioned, derelict schoolhouses and factories were typically well-built and could be great candidates for apartments or condominiums. Further, many old “Main Street” buildings were originally built as mixed-use, with the shopkeepers living above their stores. If local zoning codes aren’t an impediment, these old flats could be returned to their former use, so often just used as offices or storage, if used at all.
Historic + Affordable: Housing That Works
Amid our nationwide housing shortage, the Wisconsin Trust for Historic Preservation held the workshop “Historic + Affordable: Housing that Works” in April. The conference focused on how historic preservation can be aligned with increasing the housing supply and was held at the Taliesin estate, near Spring Green, in southwestern Wisconsin. Taliesin, a site open for tours, was the property of famed Prairie School architect and Wisconsin native Frank Lloyd Wright. I was fortunate enough to join the preservationists, architects, and financiers that day!
Kathryn Berger, former interim CEO, Wisconsin Trust for Historic Preservation
Did you know? Frank Lloyd Wright Predicted Today’s Suburbs! (City Beautiful Channel on YouTube)
Mike Lilek, president and curator of Frank Lloyd Wright’s American System-Built Homes, known as the Burnham Block in Milwaukee, led a session explaining how Wright’s company sought to lower costs and create quality affordable housing by standardizing designs and using prefabricated components. And this was from 1911 to 1917!
Mike Lilek, Curator of the "Burnham Block" in Milwaukee
Other sessions focused on technical aspects of historic preservation projects, from concept design to financing. In the session on Historic Buildings, Affordable Homes: A Developer’s Perspective, among other things, one of the speakers remarked to the audience that in the current economic environment, smaller projects and rural projects are more difficult, even more so when it is a small, rural project!
Another argument against rehabilitation of historic structures is the expensive requirements to retrofit the building to the present building code and fire code. However, while many building inspectors might say otherwise due to a lack of familiarity, Architect Chris Rute emphasized in his IEBC Performance Compliance session that the Performance Compliance Method in the International Existing Building Code (IEBC), which governs projects in Wisconsin, per Wis. Admin. Code Ch. SPS 366, does not necessarily require new sprinkler systems if there are other fire safety mechanisms in place. In plain English, this means alternatives may exist to avoid installing and maintaining expensive sprinkler systems.
All the publicly available videos from this conference’s proceedings and others, including recent Wisconsin case studies, are available on the Wisconsin Trust for Historic Preservation’s YouTube channel.
Scenes from the Historic + Affordable: Housing that Works Workshop at Taliesin, near Spring Green
Financing Historic Preservation Projects
It is often assumed that new construction is always cheaper than preserving an old building. However, when factoring in the cost of demolition and cleanup, the two can often be similar. That stated, historic structures typically need updating and rehabilitation. That is where federal and state historic tax credits (HTCs) exist for property owners to receive rebates for up to 40 percent of eligible project costs under certain conditions. Buildings will not be eligible until they receive listing on the National and State Registers of Historic Places (see below).
Many developers will pair the HTCs with the federal and state low-income housing tax credits (LIHTCs) at 9 percent and 4 percent, which offer further cash in the developer “capital stack.” Wisconsin’s housing finance authority, the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority (WHEDA), oversees the competitive process to award federal and state tax credits to eligible projects.
Wisconsin Trust for Historic Preservation (YouTube): Banking on Preservation: Financing Historic Preservation
Other related WHEDA Products:
Restore Main Street Competitive Loan
Vacancy-to-Vitality Competitive Loan
Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) Products:
Current and potential housing in historic structures in Milwaukee, Muscoda, Prairie du Chien, and Stevens Point
How to Get Started on Listing a Building on the State and National Registers of Historic Places
While in theory anyone can nominate a building for listing on the Wisconsin and National Registers, it is highly complex and technical. For most people, it would be advisable to hire a consultant who specializes in the nomination process. For more information, please visit the website of the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), a branch of the Wisconsin Historical Society.
Historic Preservation Would be Weakened
I have impressed upon you the value of historic preservation, not just for its own sake, but also for the value it brings to communities by bringing the past forward through adaptive reuse of historic structures. Current federal rulemaking seeks to weaken, perhaps exceeding what is legally possible under federal law. Below are resources to understand the issue, and the National Trust for Historic Preservation provides resources on what you can do about it.
National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers: The End of Section 106 As We Know It?
National Trust for Historic Preservation: Section 106 is Under Threat
Presentation Slides: Section 106 is Under Threat
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