A citation isn’t needed when millions of Americans are literally getting priced out of housing because of skyrocketing property taxes, insane insurance premiums, and homes being valued like they’re made of unobtanium. Everyone living through it is the citation.
Yes, housing prices are high, but how much of what you write is due to the federal government?
Property taxes are local, not federal.
Insurance premium are set by private companies regulated by states, not the federal government.
How high homes are valued is a complex issue, having to do with supply and demand. Demand is, among other things, a function of the population - more people will demand more housing. US has a lot more people than 40 years ago, or even 20 years ago - US crossed 300M in 2006. On the supply side, there is a finite amount of land in hot markets. More relaxed zoning laws could improve supply, but there is a tradeoff - too much dense infill and desirability starts to suffer because there is more traffic, and/or green space is sacrificed. The latter issue is well illustrated by Mamdani wanting to tear down Elizabeth Street Garden to build more "affordable housing".
Note that home prices are not increasing everywhere, and that the direction of the housing market is dependent on county. See
this map.
So yeah, the housing market is absolutely in flames.
I definitely do not see housing market being adequately described as being "in flames". That metaphor suggests concrete damage to the market, and a danger of collapse and destruction.
Trump’s housing policies overwhelmingly benefit investors, developers, and landlords – not families trying to keep a roof over their heads.
Which policies would that be concretely? You missed one big factor above - interest rates. Not only do higher interest rates make it more expensive to buy a home, but they also restrict supply, becaue people sitting on 3% mortgages are loathe to sell, even if it would make sense for their circumstances. Now, while increasing interest rates was by all means necessary in light of recent inflation, Trump is advocating lowering interest rates - too much so in my estimation.
His administration has also floated the idea of
"portable mortgages".
His whole playbook is just
deregulate and 
. But deregulation doesn’t reduce the actual costs of building anything.
Actually removing overly restrictive regulation could improve housing supply. Unfortunately, most of those regulations are on the state level, not federal.
You can scrap a zoning rule all day, but it won’t lower land prices, labor costs, material costs, or the permit fees states charge when taxing for each individual blade of grass. And developers don’t even look at looser zoning and say, “Wow, let’s build cheap homes for working families!” They say, “Sick dude, let’s build more luxury condos with infinity pools and valet dog-walking.”
Restrictive zoning rules and other regulation would indeed increase supply. And developers like to build luxury apartments for the same reasons they like to build >2000 sq.ft. single family homes rather than 1000 sq. ft. shotgun shacks- people like them.
But that is not the fault of the federal government now, is it?
