Long treated as a local concern, housing decisively entered the bloodstream of federal politics this year, from the presidential race on down. Democrats in particular have taken their cues from Vice President Kamala Harris, hoping a nod to voters’ housing squeeze can offset the GOP’s edge on inflation and other pocketbook concerns. That is especially true in California, land of the million-dollar starter home, where the battle for control of the House is being waged in districts that have experienced some of the state’s most acute housing sticker shock.

“The federal government has historically not been super involved in legislating in that arena because of the way that our system works,” said Jae Garner, a housing activist in Orange County, home to two of the state’s most competitive House races. This year, Garner said, “There’s this threshold that we’ve hit … All the voters at every level are saying, ‘What are you going to do to lower my housing prices?’”

In California’s six most competitive House districts, the median mortgage payment for newly purchased homes has grown between 79 and 104 percent since early 2019, ballooning at a rate even higher than the statewide average increase of 68 percent, according to data provided by Zillow. The median listed monthly rent in those areas increased by as much as $850 between 2019 and 2024.

The statistics reflect the conversations politicians are having with constituents on the ground, said Democratic Rep. Katie Porter of Orange County.

“You can see it when you listen to voters and you say, ‘I want my kids to be able to afford to live in California. I love my children, but I do not want a 32-year-old on my couch.’ You get a lot of nods. People get that. That is a very real concern,” said Porter, who waged an unsuccessful Senate run instead of seeking reelection, leaving a fierce succession battle for her swing seat.

Despite being top of mind for voters, both Republicans and Democrats say neither party has a clear advantage on the issue — a rare jump ball on economic concerns where voters tend to trust the GOP over Democrats.

In that hazy middle ground — where voters are crying out for action on housing but don’t have strong partisan opinions on whom they trust — Rollins saw an opportunity to seize the upper hand.

“We’ve actually seen that in our own polling, we are achieving parity on ‘Who do you trust more to lower the cost of living?’ And it can be hard for Democrats to reach parity,” Rollins said. “But I think this campaign proves that if you go on offense about it, you keep focusing on kitchen table issues and costs, in particular when we’re talking about costs for us on housing, we really can move the needle.”

The median mortgage payment for a new home in the district is 90 percent higher than it was for homebuyers in 2019, according to Zillow data, and the median rent has swelled by nearly 40 percent.

Zillow calculated the median mortgage payments based on an assumed 20 percent down payment on a home at the median Zestimate price, a measure the company uses to gauge home values. The figures include principal and interest, but not taxes and insurance. The spike in interest rates over the last two years was a major factor driving up costs.

In his commercials, Rollins proposes specific policies — such as cracking down on corporations buying up housing stock and passing a tax credit for first-time homebuyers — to lower costs. Rollins and his allies have also gone after Calvert for directing federal dollars to projects close to rental properties he owns, arguing that the incumbent Republican benefited from higher property values at a time that the region’s housing prices were soaring.

Calvert has responded with his own housing-inflected messaging. One ad paints Rollins as a carbon copy of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, warning that “just like Newsom, Will Rollins means higher gas, property and income taxes.”

The tie to Newsom is deliberate, according to the Calvert campaign — a bid to convince voters that Democrats, who dominate state government, shoulder the blame for California’s high housing costs.

“California has become one of the most expensive places to live in the nation because of the failed policies from Gavin Newsom and Sacramento Democrats that Will Rollins would rubber stamp in Washington, D.C,” Calvert said in a statement.

Calvert is one of a number of Republicans benefiting from housing-related ads by Congressional Leadership Fund, the prolific GOP super PAC. The commercials invoke the ultimate bugaboo of California politics — threats of a rollback of Proposition 13, the 1978 voter-approved measure which limited reassessments on property taxes and has been a third-rail of state politics ever since.

“Rollins is endorsed by a group pushing to gut Prop 13. Rollins and his cronies could force people out of their homes,” one ad intones, while photos of Rollins and Newsom appear side-by-side.

It’s a well-worn playbook, but Republicans are confident the attack line still has bite in California, particularly after a ballot measure to change those decades-old protections for commercial properties failed four years ago and was especially unpopular in the state’s swing regions.

Democrats have put more emphasis on housing supply, following in the footsteps of Harris, whose promise to build 3 million new units is a central plank in her platform, along with providing down payment assistance. (Her opponent, former President Donald Trump, has been far less specific on his plans to address housing costs, aside from cutting unspecified regulations and freeing up available housing by deporting illegal immigrants, a solution that economists and industry experts say could actually worsen the crisis.)

Kipp Mueller, a Democrat running in a competitive state Senate seat that overlaps with a toss-up House race in northern Los Angeles County, said the country has fallen so far behind in building enough housing that voters are expecting candidates at all levels of government to take action.

“It looks to me like the campaigns at the top are adapting to the times and are listening,” Mueller said. “I don’t know that I’ve ever heard it really before from a presidential campaign until Kamala’s and I welcome it.”

Even in the Central Valley, the agricultural heartland of the state — far from the coastal areas typically associated with eye-poppingly expensive real estate — Democrats have been lacing into incumbent GOP Rep. David Valadao for not doing enough on housing supply.

“What has 10 years of David Valadao’s votes in Congress gotten us? Unaffordable rent. Sky-high housing costs. And buying a house? Forget about it,” said one ad from House Majority Forward, an outside group aligned with Democratic leadership. “Valadao voted against building more houses we can afford and against rental assistance for struggling Valley families.”

The attack, lobbed in both English and Spanish in a majority-Latino area, is especially potent in Valadao’s district, where the median rent jumped by 64 percent in five years — the biggest increase in the entire state, according to Zillow data. The district also saw the second-highest bump in monthly mortgage payments for new homebuyers, which more than doubled from January 2019 to September 2024.

Valadao and his Republican allies have put less emphasis on housing in their advertisements; instead, they’ve knocked his Democratic opponent Rudy Salas over taxes and his votes as a state legislator.

There’s a healthy dose of skepticism among Valadao supporters that housing will give an advantage to the Democrats. Though public polling shows this race as a toss-up, Republicans internally feel more confident about Valadao’s chances than other targeted GOP incumbents, despite Democrats holding a double-digit registration edge in the district.

“I refuse to believe that voters, Spanish-speaking or otherwise, will make the leap of blaming Congress for California’s unaffordable housing market,” said Tal Eslick, an independent political consultant who has worked for Valadao in the past. “Voters should direct frustration towards their affluent neighbors who resist density and those who wield environmental laws to halt development. Outside groups of all stripes routinely miss the mark trying to talk to voters in the San Joaquin Valley.”

Regardless of how these races shake out, this election cycle has marked a tipping point for housing politics — and perhaps a sneak preview of how much the issue will play in future contests.

“We now have people really recognizing this as an issue, taking the right position on it, which is, we need to bring down housing costs,” said Porter, who is widely seen as a potential candidate for California governor in two years. “In 2026, you’re going to see — both at the state and federal level — those policies being rolled out.”