Agency caps are not the constraint. Source selection is.

On November 24, 2025 the Federal Housing Finance Agency announced that 2026 multifamily loan purchase caps for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would be $88 billion each, or $176 billion combined, with at least 50 percent of each Enterprise’s multifamily business required to be mission-driven affordable housing. Workforce-housing loans continue to sit outside those limits.

That is a large, functioning agency market. It is not a reason to send every apartment to the GSEs, and it is not evidence that any one originator has a dedicated allocation. MBA’s August 6, 2026 survey still found GSE originations lower year over year in Q2 even as overall commercial/multifamily borrowing rose. Caps were not the binding constraint on those files; credit, rate, and the asset were.

How we originate against it

If the asset is agency-eligible, we originate Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac Optigo and say so. If HUD 223(f) is the cleaner long-term path, we originate HUD through an approved lender — we do not claim MAP or LEAN approval. If the story is still lease-up or rehab, we originate bridge with a takeout in mind rather than pretending the GSE box will ignore the T-12.

The useful question in August 2026 is not whether agency capital exists. It does. The useful question is whether your file belongs there, or whether life, bank, CMBS, or private credit will actually close it. That is the conversation we have before anyone talks about a term sheet.