A side-by-side look at the four ways New Hampshire municipalities have put the Community Revitalization Tax Relief Incentive to work, and an illustrative skeleton of what a local adoption actually contains.
This is research and a structural template to inform the Housing Committee’s choices — not proposed Portsmouth policy and not legal text. Every figure below reflects the current statute and other communities’ adopted programs; the skeleton’s bracketed items are decisions for the committee, staff, and city legal to make. NH Housing is the state’s educator on 79-E, and city staff draft ordinances — this is meant to help that work, not substitute for it.
RSA 79-E lets a municipality grant temporary property-tax relief to owners who reinvest in qualifying buildings, in exchange for a public benefit secured by a covenant. Since 2006 it has grown from a downtown-rehabilitation tool into four distinct programs a community can adopt. About 70 NH municipalities have adopted the traditional version; only Conway has adopted a Housing Opportunity Zone; only Keene, Newport, and Derry have adopted Residential Property Revitalization zones.
| Decision | Traditional 79-E | Residential Property Revitalization (RPR) | Conversion Zone (office → residential) | Housing Opportunity Zone (HOZ) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Where it applies | Downtowns, village centers, central/neighborhood business districts the governing body designates. | Any designated residential zone — not limited to downtown or village center. | An area the governing body designates for housing redevelopment of commercial/office buildings. | A zone the governing body designates; can target existing neighborhoods or new-construction areas. |
| Eligible structures | Qualifying (generally older) commercial / mixed-use buildings undergoing substantial rehabilitation. | Residential structures at least 40 years old, up to 4 units. ADUs can qualify. | Office/commercial buildings converted to housing. (HB 1103 would broaden to other commercial/industrial.) | Multi-family housing; usable for rehabilitation or new construction. |
| Qualifying activity | Substantial rehabilitation that returns a building to productive use. | Improving the quality, condition, or use of an existing dwelling; conversions; ADUs. | Converting non-residential space into dwelling units. | Creating multi-family units, including ground-up construction. |
| Affordability requirement | None defined by statute — “affordable” is left vague (a known weakness). | None required; tool is about reuse and condition, not income limits. | None required by the conversion mechanism itself. | 1/3 of units at or below 80% AMI (or an alternative income mix). HB 1103 would let the municipality set its own standard. |
| Relief duration | Base up to 5 yrs (substantial rehab); add-ons available (e.g. +2 new units, +4 affordable units, +4 historic register), 15-yr maximum. | Same schedule as traditional 79-E; no property may receive relief more than once in a 20-year period. | Up to 10 years, beginning at certificate of occupancy. | Up to 10 years from CO. HB 1103 would set distinct terms for projects with vs. without workforce housing. |
| Public benefit (covenant) | All four require a covenant securing at least one statutory public benefit: economic vitality; cultural or historic significance; preservation of existing building stock; development of municipal centers; or housing in urban/town centers. Covenant term runs up to twice the relief period (RSA 79-E:8). | |||
| Best suited to | Reviving older downtown/mixed-use buildings. | Citywide conversions, right-sizing, and ADUs in older homes. | Turning underused commercial/office stock into housing. | New multi-family with a built-in affordability share. |
↔ Scroll the table sideways on a phone to see all four models.
Read across the table and the same handful of choices recur. A Portsmouth adoption is really a set of answers to these:
Downtown only, or citywide? Traditional 79-E is downtown-bound; RPR and HOZ are not. Portsmouth could combine more than one program to cover both.
Rehab of existing buildings, conversion of commercial space, small-home conversions/ADUs, or new multi-family — each maps to a different model.
The pivotal choice. Traditional/RPR/conversion require none; only HOZ does. If below-market units are the goal, the standard has to be written in deliberately.
How many years, by activity type, up to the statutory caps — the lever that determines how much tax is forgone and for how long.
Which statutory benefit(s) the covenant secures, and how specifically they’re defined for Portsmouth.
How the city will assess whether a project genuinely needs the relief to proceed — the safeguard against forgoing tax on projects that would happen anyway.
This is the structure an adoption document takes. It is deliberately empty where real choices live: every bracketed item is a policy decision for the committee, staff, and city legal — shown as a placeholder, not a recommendation. Seeing the anatomy is the point; the content is the city’s to write.
States that the city adopts the program under RSA 79-E and why — the local conditions and goals the program serves.
Choice[Statement of purpose — e.g. reuse of older buildings, downtown vitality, housing creation. Tie to Master Plan / Housing Action Plan goals.]Which of the four programs the city is enacting — one or several.
Choice[Traditional 79-E / RPR zone / Conversion zone / Housing Opportunity Zone — select and combine.]The geographic area(s) where relief is available, by reference to a map or district boundaries.
Choice[Boundaries / districts — e.g. downtown core, specific neighborhoods, commercial corridors, or citywide for an RPR program.]Which buildings qualify and what work counts (rehabilitation, conversion, new construction).
Choice[Structure type, age threshold, unit cap; whether new construction qualifies; ADU eligibility.]Whether a share of units must be income-restricted, at what level, and for how long.
Choice[None, or e.g. a defined share at or below a stated AMI; restriction term. The single most consequential choice if below-market units are the goal.]Years of relief, which may vary by activity type, within the statutory maximums.
Choice[Years by category, up to the RSA 79-E caps — base rehab, additional years for new units / affordable units / historic register.]Statutory ceiling: up to 15 years total for traditional 79-E; up to 10 years for HOZ / conversion zones.
Which statutory public benefit(s) the project must deliver, secured by covenant.
Choice[One or more of: economic vitality; cultural/historic significance; preservation of building stock; development of municipal centers; housing in urban/town centers — defined for Portsmouth.]Who applies, to whom, on what timeline, and which body decides.
Choice[Application contents and fee; reviewing department(s); governing-body hearing and decision timeline; template documents.]The findings the governing body must make before granting — including that relief is needed for the project to proceed.
Choice[How the city assesses financial need / but-for; what evidence an applicant must show. A known administrative challenge — worth a defined method.]The recorded covenant binding the property to the public benefit for a set term.
Choice[Covenant duration — up to twice the relief period per RSA 79-E:8 — and the obligations it secures.]Staff capacity, oversight, and a date to review how the program is working.
Choice[Administering department; annual reporting; sunset or review date. NH Housing flags staff capacity as a common adoption challenge.]A 2026 bill, HB 1103, would expand 79-E by letting municipalities define affordability themselves, apply the tool to a wider range of property types, and use it for new construction — and would broaden “office conversion” zones into broader residential conversion zones.
As of this writing it has moved through House committee but has not been enacted, and its final terms (including relief durations) are not settled. Treat its provisions as anticipated, not current — and confirm status before any adoption relies on them.