Many North Carolinians are still not back home after Helene struck almost two years ago.
That includes some of those who have applied for aid via the state’s home repair and reconstruction program, which is one of the avenues through which those whose homes were damaged or destroyed are getting help.
And not all those who have sought aid from that program and been deemed eligible are guaranteed to get it, state Secretary of Commerce Lee Lilley said in an interview with The News & Observer.
Helene damaged more than 73,000 homes at a cost of $15.4 billion when it hit the state in September 2024, the state’s Office of State Budget and Management estimated three months later. Of those homes, 8,800 were seriously damaged or destroyed.
The Renew NC single-family housing program prioritizes low- and moderate-income families with seniors, children or people with disabilities, and homes located in the “most impacted and distressed” of the 29 counties hit by Helene that it serves.
Lilley said that they want to make sure “we’re covering the sort of most at risk, most high need cases first … and I have total confidence that everybody who’s eligible there will get covered.”
The question is “whether or not we will have sufficient funds for people at the back of the priority list,” he said.
According to a state dashboard, there are:
- 2,228 active applications.
- 5,696 applications that are inactive or ineligible.
There are four priority tiers, with:
- 1,818 applications in priority one, the most-high-need tier
- 255 in priority two
- 101 in priority three
- 22 in priority four.
The uncertainty surrounding what they’ll be able to cover, Lilley said, is largely because the program has a hard cap on its funds while the costs of materials continues to rise.
New program to handle Helene-hit homes
Instead of routing Helene housing recovery through what’s been dubbed ReBuild NC, Gov. Josh Stein created a new division within the Commerce Department to run the Renew NC program.
ReBuild NC was the housing program created by former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper to rebuild after Eastern North Carolina hurricanes Matthew and Florence. It saw heavy criticism, including from those impacted and lawmakers in the GOP-led legislature, related to delays in helping families who lost homes, as well as related to financial mismanagement.
Through Renew NC’s programs, the new division manages more than $1.4 billion in federal Community Development Block Grant funds disbursed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Of those, $807 million support the single-family housing program, which launched on June 16, 2025, and accepted applications for seven months.
Stein has asked for more federal money, including $3 billion for housing needs, with part of it for the single-family program. State lawmakers have also provided over $3 billion for Helene recovery.
Estimating how many will be covered
While the Commerce Department in Stein’s administration says it’s unclear whether there will be enough money to reach applicants beyond the highest-need cases, an official in a state agency created by Stein for Helene recovery said a far larger group could go unserved.
There are 378 applicants across all tiers below Tier One, the highest-need tier, according to the dashboard.
But it was estimated that about 2,100 families who would qualify for the Renew NC single-family housing program would not be able to be served with the current federal appropriations, Forrest Gilliam, legislative director of the Governor’s Recovery Office of Western North Carolina, said in a June meeting of a bipartisan group looking at Helene recovery needs.
Matt Calabria, director of the Governor’s Office for Western North Carolina, said in an email Tuesday that the 2,100 figure was calculated using HUD methodology and reflects how many single-family homes are projected to remain unrepaired at current funding levels. He said that included people who could be eligible but may not have applied or currently do not have active projects.
“We know that the unmet housing need for people recovering from Helene is greater than what is in the Renew NC pipeline, and all indications suggest that existing federal funding will not be enough to cover the recovery’s entire single- and multifamily housing needs, which is one reason Governor Stein has continued to advocate for an additional federal appropriation,” Calabria said. He added that the state was also working with volunteers and nonprofits, having helped more than 1,100 families so far through that collaboration.
Part of the reason Commerce hasn’t fully determined how many eligible applicants it can cover, Lilley said, is that nearly 1,000 applicants haven’t yet made it to the award determination stage — where details on whether they’ll have a home rebuilt or repaired, the floor plan and more are determined.
Over 1,000 have had awards determined and the majority have been for full reconstructions. It could be about another nine months to get everyone through the award determinations, which will provide clarity on total costs, Lilley said.
As for letting people know they might not get help, Lilley said the caseworkers try to reach families every couple of weeks with updates, but when it comes to telling them whether they’ll get an award, “that conversation doesn’t occur till you get to award determination.”
Estimates available in April indicated a weighted average cost of over $276,000 per home, requiring $1.02 billion in funding for Western North Carolina, said Stephanie McGarrah of the commerce department earlier this year.
She told lawmakers at the time they’d be closer to an exact number by the end of year and that the agency had asked for more money from the federal government, “but the plans are, we will stop serving people if we don’t have enough money, and we will let you know about that. And if you decide you want to try to use state funds, you can let us know.”
Three year goal
At the time, McGarrah laid out a goal to have homes rebuilt within three years. Lilley said the agency still expected to meet that timeline.
He said the three-year clock started when the state received its HUD award.
North Carolina submitted its Action Plan in March 2025, and HUD approved the Action Plan in April 2025.
Renew NC completed repairs on its first home for the Single-Family Housing Program in August 2025.
Currently, the dashboard shows:
- 156 homes having had construction completed.
- 157 in construction.
- 630 in pre-construction.
- 362 in the award determination step.
If the target completion date were around April 2028, that would mean that over 2,000 homes remain to finish in 19 months, or an average of about 105 homes a month. That would require speeding up the rate of completion.
Lilley said the Renew NC program has already been one of the fastest rebuilding programs in state history and “well ahead of many other programs across the country.”
The over 600 applicants in pre-construction are up from 72 at the start of the year. There were 2,800 in intake review then, and now there are 36.
“So you’re seeing a very, very steady matriculation of survivor families through this program, and importantly into award determination and pre-construction,” Lilley said.
The program has offered standardized floor plans to avoid issues with customization and to make budgets easier to follow. Lilley said that worked well, but a floor plan doesn’t always work on a plot of land, and requires changes. Customization is also needed for those with disabilities. Sometimes, as much of the work is happening in rural areas or small towns, there might not be enough personnel for timely inspections, he said.
Renew NC relies on outside firms. In May, the state awarded Horne LLP a three-year, $81.5 million management contract. Construction work itself is handled through separate contracts with builders.
Horne was acquired by BDO USA in November 2025. Lilley said the acquisition didn’t lead to a big shift in the personnel handling the state contract and that it’s been a “fairly smooth” transition.
Temporary housing aid
One other program recently launched is temporary housing assistance, said Lilley.
Lilley told The N&O last year that Renew NC sought to avoid providing temporary housing aid, which for ReBuild NC, the Eastern North Carolina program, had led to extended stays and unpredictable costs.
“We went into this thinking, let’s not repeat what we saw as something that was not beneficial in the previous experience. Reality came and clashed with that pretty immediately,” he said last Friday.
Lawmakers provided $40 million in the budget signed into law in July by Stein to support Renew NC’s Temporary Relocation Assistance program.
McGarrah said in April that program would need $60 million for single-family applicants who make less than 70% of the area median income and have a demonstrated hardship.
Lilley said finding a hotel room that “is safe and comfortable and hopefully close to their home, doctor, church, school, where it is they live, and also meets our pricing requirement is a challenge.”
Lilley said they’ve examined what went wrong last time, structured it to prioritize those with the highest need, and are also running the program through the general contractors.
People move out of their homes once they have the notice to proceed (ReBuild NC applicants could move out before that) and the general contractor handles the money and therefore has an incentive not to let someone “languish,” because it’ll cut into “their bottom line,” Lilley said. That’s because the state pays out a maximum number of nights based on project type, with the builder responsible for any overages.
Will the $40 million be enough?
Enough for “a portion,” per Lilley. He said about 600 are in the program right now and there’s probably enough for between 1,500 and 1,800 applicants.
He said if needed they’d ask the General Assembly for more money. “We’ve been pretty upfront with them about our efforts to control cost on this while also keeping the program moving,” he said.
This story was originally published September 23, 2026 at 5:00 AM.
