Re: Affordable housing percentage
From: David Mandel (dlmandelpacbell.net)
Date: Fri, 18 Oct 2002 00:26:02 -0600 (MDT)
1. Have clear blueprints for how to handle resales, especially if you want
to maintain the units' affordability. (See archives for how our system is
set up). Think about all the what ifs, including how to resist community
pressure when an established higher-income member wants to buy one of the
low-income units. (This has been a big problem for us -- we have lost two
originally affordable units.)

2. Consider setting up a capital fund for improvements with a sliding-scale
monthly assessment. The amount can be fairly small and thus not feel like a
hardship for anyone yet create a fund that can be drawn when a project is
proposed. The community debate becomes one of setting priorities for such
projects, with everyone having contributed something and now on an equal
footing, instead of having to figure out each time where the money may come
from. This has worked quite well for us. Each household declares itself low,
medium or high on the ability to pay scale -- honor system, no documentation
necessary. Low end for the smallest unit (1 BR) is $2/month; high is
$20/month for the biggest unit (4 BR), with other steps in between. This
gets us about $10,000 in five years. It goes into the general HOA funds, but
is tracked for bookkeeping purposes. We spend it as we go, borrowing from
general reserves along the way as long as it doesn't create a cash flow
problem.

David Mandel
Southside Park, Sacramento



----- Original Message -----
From: "Bruce Hecht" <brucehe [at] peak.org>
To: "Cohousing-L" <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org>
Sent: Thursday, October 17, 2002 12:31 AM
Subject: [C-L]_Affordable housing percentage


> We have had discussions over the past couple of years with a non-profit
> neighborhood housing organization about developing an affordable cohousing
> project. Well, things are getting a bit more serious and exciting as a
> parcel of land is available they could procure. The costs pencil out below
> market on a per lot or unit  basis.  We both agree we would like to do a
> mixed income project of affordable and market rate units. In fact it could
> be possible to do 50% of the units as affordable (to those from 50-80% of
> median income). Any thoughts or experience doing cohousing project with a
> high percentage of affordable units? One comment or concern I hear is that
> it will be difficult in the future to get the community to do any
> improvements to the property as there will be not be a lot of available
> income. Any thoughts?
>
> Bruce Hecht
> Corvallis, OR
>
>
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