Homes within reach - Affordable housing units to open on Westside
By CHELSI MOY of the Missoulian
It's like music to the ears - affordable homes have hit the Missoula housing market.
Construction crews on Monday finished last-minute details on the Burns Street Commons, an affordable housing project in Missoula's Westside neighborhood.
The 17-unit housing complex, a mix of townhouses and condominiums at 1400 Burns St., is aimed at providing homes for medium-income working families who may not otherwise be able to afford one.
On Wednesday, the public is invited to attend an open house at 3 p.m., when Mayor John Engen and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., will talk about the two-year-long neighborhood-revitalization project. Those interested will have an opportunity to tour the different housing units and ask questions of project organizers.
The block of bright yellow, green and blue housing units off Burns Street is a bright spot in a low-income neighborhood of mostly mobile homes.
Construction workers finish the last few details Monday morning at the Burns Street Commons, the 17-unit housing component of Burns Street Square. The square is a project of the North-Missoula Community Development Corp.
KURT WILSON/Missoulian
There's a stigma associated with affordable housing, said Jerry Petasek, Land Steward program coordinator for North-Missoula Community Development Corp., the local nonprofit heading the project. So organizers intentionally designed the complex to be aesthetically pleasing - with a focus on bright colors and nice landscaping.
NMCDC purchased the land in 2006 and broke ground on the $2.7-million construction project last fall.
The homes range in price from $112,000 to $150,000, and several are fully equipped for people who use wheelchairs. One of the units is selling at market price. Already, three of the homes have interested buyers.
The reason the community development group can keep the prices low is because the organization sells the homes, but the land underneath them remains in a trust.
There are one-bedroom, two-bedroom and three-bedroom homes available. They range in size from 638 square feet to 1,250 square feet. All have either a porch, balcony or ground-level entry on a shared courtyard common area.
They are available to first-time homebuyers who make 80 percent of the area median income, which is $31,000 for a single person, $35,450 for a couple and $39,850 for a family of three.
NMCDC executive director Bob Oaks often reminds renters that the thing most often keeping them from owning a new home is not a small salary, but big debt.
In fact, some people who have turned to the neighborhood nonprofit in the past actually made too much money to qualify for one of its affordable subsidized housing units.
“A lot of people think
they can't afford a home,” Oaks said. “We hear that a great deal.”
Sometimes it takes a dozen applicants before a suitable buyer is found, he said.
This is the third publicly funded affordable housing project since NMCDC's inception in 2000. The first was Whittier Court, a five-home project completed in 2002. The second was Clark Fork Commons, with 25 homes finished in 2006.
The neighborhood nonprofit purchased the land at 1400 Burns St. in 2006 for $675,385, using private and public loans, grants and donations.
Finding affordable land to develop in Missoula is tough, Oaks said. But juggling financing from multiple agencies, private donors and foundations, and piecing together a complex financing package for the entire project, was even more difficult.
Oaks looked out a second-floor window on Monday at a set of old grimy garage doors nearby. Those will be a wall of glass windows with an entrance to a small cafe and commercial kitchen someday, he said.
NMCDC has received a $1 million federal appropriation to finish its revitalization efforts, which include transforming a neighboring old freight building into a community center. Missoula's food co-op. already occupies part of the building.
For more information on the housing project, contact Petasek at NMCDC, 829-8414.
Reporter Chelsi Moy can be reached at 523-5260 or at chelsi.moy@missoulian.com.
