It’s no secret the U.S. is in the midst of an affordable housing crisis. Rents are spiraling out of control while incomes stagnate, with rents increasing at more than triple the rate of wages over the last 50 years.

The increasingly desperate situation has led nine U.S. foundations, including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Ford Foundation, to announce that they are launching a partnership to tackle systemic problems in the housing market. The aim: to ensure that the more than 11 million families across the country that spend more than half of their paycheck on rent and those who are homeless have access to safe, affordable housing.

The partnership, called Funders For Housing and Opportunity, has divided an initial $4.9 million in grant money between four nonprofits that tackle housing insecurity.

The largest grant, $2.7 million over three years, goes to the National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC), which is working to launch a multi-sector housing campaign including organizations from across the healthcare, civil rights, education and anti-poverty fields.

The NLIHC was behind stark research last year into rent affordability, which found that for those working a 40-hour week on the minimum wage, there is no state in the country where a modest two-bedroom rental home is affordable (defined as costing less than 30 percent of the renters’ income).

At a time families are “making choices between their housing payments and buying healthy food, medicine or school supplies for their kids,” said Sue Henderson, Habitat for Humanity International’s vice president for the United States and Canada, this new partnership is to be welcomed.

Read the full article about foundations helping the affordable housing crisis by Laura Paddison at The Huffington Post.