Whoever wins the Blaine House next month will inherit a housing problem every builder in Maine already knows by heart: prices are up, rents are up, and getting a project permitted takes too long.
The numbers are stark. According to The Maine Monitor, the median price of a home in Maine rose 67% from August 2019 to this August, citing the Maine Association of Realtors, and median monthly rent for a two-bedroom rose 52% from 2019 to 2025. This summer, 90% of people who took a survey for the Maine Affordable Housing Coalition said the next governor should tackle the housing shortage and the cost of housing.
The Monitor interviewed all three candidates in September. Democrat Hannah Pingree wants to keep investing in affordable housing, Republican Bobby Charles is focused on property tax cuts, and independent Rick Bennett wants to help homebuyers directly. Voters pick on Tuesday, Nov. 3.
Where they stand
Hannah Pingree spent six years running the Governor's Office of Policy Innovation and the Future, the office that found in 2023 that Maine would need up to 84,000 new units by 2030. Her plan mostly builds on what the state is already doing: $100 million for building new housing and preserving existing homes, bigger programs for affordable middle-income and senior housing, and an expanded mortgage program for first-time buyers.
For builders, two pieces stand out. Pingree has pledged to review permitting at the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, the Office of State Fire Marshal and elsewhere. And she wants to grow the local construction workforce by permanently funding free community college and working with companies and unions on more apprenticeships.
"We have got to do everything we possibly can to make it easier to build housing, to let the market build more housing, let people do more of what they want on their own land, but also subsidize some of the housing units that we need," she said.
Bobby Charles, a former U.S. State Department official, wants to raise the homestead exemption from $25,000 to $100,000, revamp state revenue sharing to reward towns that lower property taxes and eventually eliminate the income tax. He has also proposed reducing regulations, saying permitting and some requirements for roofing, insulation and sprinklers are driving up costs unnecessarily.
"You've got to allow the builders to go ahead and build without a lot of these regulations," Charles told the Monitor. "You need to think in terms of: How do you lower property taxes, so people can stay in the house?"
Rick Bennett, a state senator who runs two rental properties, is the only one focused on putting money in buyers' hands. He'd create a state-backed down payment guarantee that would insure up to three-quarters of a down payment, so first-time buyers could put less cash down upfront. He'd also have the state help with monthly mortgage bills in exchange for a share of the home's appreciation when it sells.
Bennett also wants an online permit tracking system so officials can see where applications get stuck, and his campaign website says he'd propose a bond to "support Maine's factory-built housing industry, improve the state's housing workforce and repair our existing homes."
The Monitor also talked with groups that will be pressing whoever wins. The National Association of Home Builders estimates that about 26% of the cost of a single-family house comes from dealing with regulations at every level of government. Karl Eckhart of NAHB said shortening the permitting process "can lower the costs by thousands of dollars," since builders' construction loans keep running up interest the longer a project takes.
Kate Dufour of the Maine Municipal Association said towns don't want one-size-fits-all state zoning rules and would rather choose from different models. Laura Mitchell of the Maine Affordable Housing Coalition said state funding remains essential. Without it, "a lot of this housing would not get built, period," she said, "and not at a price affordable to people working in Maine."
All three candidates support expanding the homestead exemption in some form, according to the Monitor.
Why it matters for Contractors
Permitting, codes and workforce are effectively on the ballot this year. Pingree is talking about reviewing DEP and Fire Marshal permitting and funding apprenticeships. Charles is talking about cutting rules on roofing, insulation and sprinklers. Bennett wants online permit tracking and a bond for factory-built housing, which could matter a lot to modular and panelized builders. Any of those would change how fast and how cheaply Maine contractors can build, and state housing money pays for a lot of the multifamily work out there. Read the plans closely before Nov. 3.