02/17/2026
Austin and Portland, OR have passed two of the most expansive zoning reforms to allow Missing Middle Housing in single-family areas. Those reforms have led to modestly more housing, and importantly, they have NOT led to higher rates of demolitions.
One of the most understandable fears around zoning reform is that it will have the unintended consequence of seeing an increase in existing affordable homes being torn down. However, that fear hasn't come to pass. Portland passed zoning reform in 2022, and it has seem demolitions rise from pandemic lows but stay below or about equal to the pre-pandemic years of 2018 and 2019: https://www.portland.gov/bps/planning/rip2/news/2025/2/4/portland-sees-significant-production-middle-housing-resulting
Closer to Dallas, Austin's HOME policy passed in early 2024, and while the results are still early, so far there has been no noticeable change: https://communityimpact.com/austin/north-central-austin/government/2025/11/19/austins-home-policy-spurs-hundreds-of-housing-units-in-1st-year-cost-displacement-trends-unclear/
Tear-downs of single-family homes are an all too common occurrence in Dallas as is. Take the two photos of the corner of Coronado Ave and Tucker Street in East Dallas as an example. Matt Goodman in 2019 wrote a piece outlining the phenomenon: https://www.dmagazine.com/publications/d-magazine/2019/july/the-bulldozers-are-coming-to-your-neighborhood/ . There is an argument to be made for tightening the rules around demolitions. But passing zoning reform isn't likely to cause more demolitions, and it could even help stem them long-term by helping to temper demand by creating more housing.
That's not to say that the Missing Middle Housing policies of Austin and Portland are a silver bullet for affordable housing (that's a post for another day), but from a planning perspective, replacing a smaller single-family home with a larger single-family home like Dallas mostly does today is no way to make the city more affordable.
