Washington’s Affordability Crisis
What the 2026 Legislative Session Is Really Telling Us About the Cost of Living
By: Jessie Simmons
The Government Affairs Desk
Category: Affordability & Cost of Living
Affordability has become the defining political word in Washington. It appears in press releases, bill titles, and campaign messaging. But affordability is not a slogan. It is a lived experience, measured every month in rent checks, grocery receipts, child care invoices, gas prices, utility bills, insurance premiums, and taxes.
As the 2026 legislative session begins, the most important question is not whether lawmakers say they care about affordability. It is whether the policies they are advancing meaningfully reduce the cost structure of living and doing business in Washington, or whether they simply manage the consequences of a system that continues to grow more expensive.
Washington has passed real reforms in recent years, especially in housing. It has also continued to add taxes, fees, mandates, and enforcement regimes that raise costs across the economy. Both are true. The early 2026 bill file reflects that same tension.
What follows is a grounded look at the major affordability drivers in Washington, the bills that brought us to this point, and the prefiled legislation that signals where lawmakers intend to take the state next.
Housing: the largest affordability driver
Housing remains the single biggest pressure point for Washington households. Over the past several sessions, lawmakers enacted some of the most significant housing reforms in state history. Zoning laws were loosened to allow middle housing. Accessory dwelling units were made easier to build. Minimum parking requirements near transit were reduced. Permit timelines were tightened and consolidated. SEPA requirements were narrowed for many housing projects. Targeted relief was created for utility connection charges on certain affordable housing developments.
Those reforms were substantive and necessary. They addressed legal barriers, delay, and uncertainty that had constrained housing supply for decades.
At the same time, major cost drivers remain. Appeals and litigation risk beyond SEPA still add time and financing uncertainty. Utility connection timing and charges remain expensive and unpredictable for most market rate housing. Local governments can comply with state law while quietly reintroducing costs through design standards, frontage requirements, discretionary review, and fee schedules. Rent stabilization, enacted in 2025, has provided stability for some tenants but has also increased financing risk for new rental housing.
The 2026 signals in housing reflect this mixed posture.
Bills that point toward solving affordability include SB 5612, sponsored by Senator Jesse Salomon, a Democrat, along with Senators Marko Liias and T’wina Nobles, also Democrats. The bill expands categorical SEPA exemptions for multiunit housing in urban growth areas and directly targets delay risk. SB 5614, sponsored by Salomon with Democratic colleagues, addresses impact fee timing and vesting, acknowledging that unpredictable fees raise prices. SB 5615 continues permit process reforms for residential projects. HB 1438, sponsored by Representative Connors, a Republican, pushes for more efficient permit approvals. SB 5748, sponsored by Senator Jeff Wilson, a Republican, incentivizes the reduction or elimination of impact fees, directly confronting a government imposed housing cost.
Bills that lean toward managing rather than solving affordability include SB 5222, which builds on the rent stabilization framework and expands enforcement. SB 5496 restricts certain institutional purchases of single family homes, a politically popular move that does not create new housing units. SB 5770 proposes a primary residence property tax exemption, offering relief to some homeowners while shifting costs elsewhere. HB 2025 and SB 5771 expand the Working Families Tax Credit to offset property tax impacts embedded in rent, helping households after costs rise rather than lowering those costs in the first place.
The housing message from the bill file is clear. Washington is serious about allowing more housing. It is less consistent about making housing affordable enough to build at scale.
Taxes and fees: the cost layer Washington keeps adding
Taxes and fees shape affordability far beyond April 15. Over the last session, Washington expanded sales taxes into new service categories, increased business tax surcharges, raised capital gains and estate taxes, and added transportation related taxes and fees. Each policy may have merit on its own. Together, they raise the baseline cost of living and doing business.
In 2026, the most consequential proposal is HB 2100, branded as Well Washington, sponsored by Representative Shaun Scott, a Democrat. The bill creates a new payroll expense style excise tax to fund state services. Whatever its intent, it is not a cost reduction measure. It is a revenue expansion strategy that will ripple through wages, prices, and investment decisions.
On the relief side, SB 5340 and SB 5341, sponsored by Senator Phil Fortunato, a Republican, propose sales tax exemptions on essentials and children’s products. These bills provide visible relief to households but raise real questions about long term budget sustainability if not paired with spending restraint.
The tax signal from 2026 so far points more strongly toward managing affordability through new revenue than toward reducing state created costs.
Energy and transportation: the quiet multiplier
Energy policy is affordability policy. Washington’s climate framework has permanently changed the cost structure of fuel, electricity, materials, and logistics. Those costs flow directly into housing construction, food prices, and household budgets.
The most notable affordability oriented energy proposals are HB 2090 and SB 5821, sponsored by a bipartisan group including Representative Stephanie Barnard, a Republican, and Senator John Braun, a Republican, alongside Democratic co sponsors such as Senator Sharon Shewmake. These bills integrate advanced nuclear energy into Washington’s long term energy planning. Their significance is not ideological. It is practical. Reliable, scalable power is essential to preventing long term rate escalation.
Beyond these bills, much of Washington’s energy policy continues to focus on revenue allocation and mitigation rather than cost prevention.
Child care: the second mortgage
For many families, child care costs rival housing. Washington has expanded subsidies and oversight in recent years, but provider shortages persist and regulatory requirements raise barriers to entry. National scrutiny around child care fraud has added uncertainty, increasing the risk of overcorrection that could shrink supply.
A meaningful affordability signal in 2026 is SB 5416, sponsored by Senator Chris Gildon, a Republican, and Senator Mike Chapman, a Democrat. The bill reduces barriers for providers and reflects a supply side approach that can increase availability and lower prices over time.
In contrast, SB 5062, sponsored by Senator Derek Stanford, a Democrat, establishes a child care workforce standards board. While intended to improve conditions, such boards can raise operating costs if not paired with durable funding, often resulting in higher tuition or fewer slots.
The child care bill file suggests Washington remains more focused on managing affordability through subsidies and standards than on expanding supply.
Health care: affordability by expansion or restraint
Health care costs continue to outpace inflation. Provider shortages and behavioral health demand strain both households and the state budget.
SB 5083, requested by the Health Care Authority and sponsored by a bipartisan group including Senator June Robinson, a Democrat, aims to expand access to primary and behavioral health care. Its affordability impact depends on implementation and cost controls.
SB 5948, sponsored by Senator Bob Hasegawa, a Democrat, advances work on a universal health care system. This is a system building proposal, not a cost containment measure, and it signals a future need for substantial new revenue.
Health care remains an area where Washington is planning affordability rather than delivering it.
Wages, labor rules, and service costs
Labor costs are embedded in the price of nearly everything. SB 5339, sponsored by Senator Phil Fortunato, a Republican, ties Washington’s minimum wage increases to the federal minimum wage. Whether one supports it or not, the bill directly targets a cost escalator rather than redistributing after the fact.
At the same time, payroll based taxes like HB 2100 increase employment costs and influence wage and price decisions statewide.
Public safety and homelessness: an overlooked affordability driver
Public safety and visible disorder affect affordability through insurance costs, security expenses, business closures, and lost tax base. Housing focused solutions like HB 1195 and SB 5497, which address siting and compliance for shelters and supportive housing, matter, but they do not replace the need for a functioning behavioral health system that moves people through treatment and stabilization.
Here again, the pattern is management rather than resolution.
What serious affordability reform would look like
If the Legislature were serious about solving affordability, not just managing it, the agenda would look different.
It would enforce housing reforms against local noncompliance and limit the ability to re add costs through implementation. It would further reduce appeal and litigation risk for compliant infill housing. It would treat utility connection timing and cost as an affordability emergency, with firm deadlines and transparency. It would pause new state created cost adders until the budget stabilizes. It would prioritize child care supply over new layers of process. It would align climate goals with energy reliability and price stability. It would expand behavioral health capacity with clear throughput and accountability.
None of these ideas are radical. All of them target the cost curve itself.
The signal Washington families should watch
The 2026 session is sending mixed signals. There are lawmakers filing real affordability tools, especially around housing process reform, impact fees, child care supply, and energy reliability. There is also a strong push toward new revenue, expanded enforcement, and program growth in a state where families already feel stretched.
That tension will define the session.
By the end, Washingtonians will not need talking points to judge the outcome. They will know it by what they pay each month.
