Civil actions: housing development projects

The law extends an existing tool for protecting affordable-housing developments from meritless, bad-faith delay lawsuits to qualifying student housing. Courts must account for a plaintiff’s ability to pay and may waive a bond for undue economic hardship.

What the law does ​

• Allows defendants in challenges to qualifying student housing projects to request a bond securing delay-related costs and damages.
• Requires defendants to show the lawsuit lacks merit and was filed in bad faith, vexatiously, to delay the project, or to thwart its student-housing purpose.
• Caps a plaintiff’s liability at $500,000 and permits courts to reduce or waive a bond when it would cause undue economic hardship.
• Makes developers repay the bond-obtaining cost if they later change a project in bad faith so it no longer qualifies as student housing or low- or moderate-income housing.

Who it affects ​

• Public universities and developers of university-owned student housing projects.
• Plaintiffs and community groups challenging qualifying student housing projects.
• Courts deciding requests for security bonds in project-delay lawsuits.