California
QAP scoring guide.
California Tax Credit Allocation Committee (CTCAC), Office of the California State Treasurer · 2026 QAP
Competitive scoring
Not stated in the QAP regulatory text itself, but CTCAC's companion annual "Minimum Point Threshold" memo (most recently for the 2026 competition, consistent with 2024 and 2025) sets a floor of 93 points out of the possible 109 for a general 9% application to be eligible for a reservation at all. That is a floor, not a reported average winning score, but because rounds are heavily oversubscribed and most of the available points come in large discrete blocks (the 52-point Lowest Income category and 10-point Readiness/Housing-Type categories dominate the total), most funded projects cluster at or very near the 109-point maximum, with 93 effectively functioning as the practical cutoff. This figure is sourced to CTCAC's separate "9 Percent Memo," not the QAP/regulations PDF itself.
Select a category to read its scoring criteria.
01General Partner / Management Company Experience
10 pts
02Negative Points
up to -10 per project/violation (deduction, not additive) pts
03Housing Needs (Housing Type)
10 pts
04Site Amenities
15 pts
05Service Amenities
10 pts
06Lowest Income
52 pts
07Readiness to Proceed
10 pts
08Miscellaneous Federal and State Policies
2 pts
California Code of Regulations, Title 4, Division 17, Chapter 1: Section 10325 "Application Selection Criteria - Credit Ceiling Applications" (regulation pp. 31-72 of the March 2026 PDF) for 9% competitive scoring — see subsection (c) "SCORING" (numbered categories 1-9) and subsections (f)-(g) for basic and housing-type-specific thresholds; Section 10326 "Application Selection Criteria - Tax-Exempt Bond Applications" (pp. 73-77) for the 4%/bond threshold-only treatment; Section 10315 "Set-asides and Apportionments" (pp. 12-14) for pools/geographic regions; and the CTCAC companion memo "Establishing Minimum Point Score Thresholds for [Year] Nine Percent Applications" (most recently the 2026 9 Percent Memo) for the annual minimum/maximum score figures (93/109 for 2026).
Tie-breakers
Review the agency’s tie-breaker rules alongside the scoring criteria.
- SF/LA regional competitions only: formal support letter from the city's housing agency breaks ties first
- Statewide: skip a tied application whose housing-type goal is met, unless it's top-ranked in its set-aside/region/apportionment
- Highest Leveraged Soft Resources Ratio — soft funds/donated land as share of total development cost (with size bonus)
- Highest value of one minus (requested eligible basis ÷ total development cost), divided by two
- Higher Resource Area bonus for qualifying new-construction Large Family projects (5-20 points by tract type)
- Additional 5-point bump for Rural set-aside projects in counties with no tax credit awards in 5 years
Development strategy
Explore the documented considerations behind a competitive application.
Undersize the bond request -- but not below 27.5%
Sponsors still commonly size the CA bond request near the federal 25% minimum (effective for bonds issued on/after Jan 1, 2026) and well under CDLAC's 30% state ceiling (waivable to 40%). But as of the December 10, 2025 CDLAC regulations, sizing below 27.5% of aggregate depreciable basis plus land basis earns no extra tiebreaker credit: Section 5106(f)(2)(A) assumes the greater of 27.5% of that basis or the actual amount requested, specifically to stop sponsors from gaming a low bond request for tiebreaker advantage.
CDLAC Regulations §5106(f)(2)(A) and §5108(b) (adopted Dec. 10, 2025, effective Round 1 2026) ↗Reposition toward deeper affordability and special-needs targeting
CDLAC's tiebreaker still rewards deeper affordability and special-needs population targeting through its ELI and special-populations benefit factors -- but the mechanics were substantially rewritten in the December 10, 2025 regulations (effective Round 1, 2026): a new homeless-per-capita population benefit, Farmworker State Credits excluded from the cost denominator, new labor/construction-type/basis-delta cost adjusters, plus the 27.5% bond floor above. The old standalone 2021 "Tie-Breaker Framework" PDF is gone -- the tiebreaker is now codified directly in regulation, not a separate framework document.
CDLAC Regulations §5106(f) (adopted Dec. 10, 2025) ↗Don't assume MHP requires 4% credits
MHP's January 2020 NOFA really did exclude 9%-credit projects -- but HCD reversed that in its very next round (July 2021), and the current Final Guidelines (Feb. 2025) affirmatively set developer-fee limits for 9% MHP projects right alongside 4% ones. The one live restriction is narrower than a general rule: the 2026 MHP Gap Funding NOFA specifically requires 4% credits plus tax-exempt bonds -- that's a condition of that one time-limited $240M round, not of the base MHP program.
HCD -- Multifamily Housing Program Final Guidelines (Feb. 13, 2025); MHP NOFA Round 4 (July 23, 2021) ↗Underwriting parameters
California Code of Regulations, Title 4, Division 17, Chapter 1 (CTCAC Regulations, the QAP), Section 10327 "Financial Feasibility and Determination of Credit Amounts" (regulation pp. 78-89 of the March 2026 PDF) — specifically subsection (c)(2) developer fee, (c)(7) reserve accounts, (f) determination of feasibility, and (g) underwriting criteria (DCR, vacancy, escalation, opex floor); cross-referenced basic threshold requirements at Section 10325(f)(5) (9% deals) and Section 10326(g)(4) (bond/4% deals); fees at Section 10335.
Utility allowance
Preferred method: energy_consumption_model (California Utility Allowance Calculator / CUAC) — required when a project falls within CUAC's eligible scope; otherwise no single method is preferred and applicants may use any source consistent with 26 CFR 1.42-10
California Utility Allowance Calculator (CUAC) ↗CTCAC Regulations Section 10322(h)(21) ("Utility allowance estimates"), with cross-reference at Section 10337(c)(1); CUAC scope tied to Section 10325(f)(7)(A)