Center for Policy Research
Property Tax Web Series
Picking Up the PACE: Loans for Residential Climate-Proofing
Cameron LaPoint, Aymeric Bellon, Francesco Mazzola, and Guosong Xu
December 2024
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Abstract
Residential Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) loans allow homeowners to fund investments in green residential projects through their property tax payments. We collect new PACE loan-level data and develop a novel approach to recover households’ home improvement investment decisions from permit descriptions. PACE projects are capitalized into home values, but expansions of the property tax base are partially offset by an uptick in tax delinquency rates among borrowers. Lenders in PACE-enabled counties expand mortgage credit access, indicating improved recovery values despite a PACE lien’s super seniority. Overall, PACE adoption increases local fiscal income while improving climate-proofing of the housing stock.
This paper was presented by Cameron LaPoint (Yale University) on December 6, 2024 as part of the 2024-2025 Syracuse-Chicago Webinar Series on Property Tax Administration and Design. Philip Mulder (University of Wisconsin-Madison) was the discussant for this presentation.
This Syracuse-Chicago Webinar Series on Property Tax Administration and Design aims to gather insight and scholarship through domestic and international comparative studies with common threads to help reform and improve property tax administration and design in the U.S. and other countries facing similar problems.
For questions about the webinars, please contact Heidi Perry. For questions about this paper, please contact the author or authors.