Arlington

New affordable housing concept breaking ground in East Arlington Friday

Nonprofit Housing Channel is spearheading the project in partnership with the City of Arlington and UT Arlington

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It's no surprise that affordable housing in North Texas is hard to come by. It's an issue at the forefront of city leaders across the Metroplex.

But a new partnership between the City of Arlington, the nonprofit Housing Channel in Fort Worth, and the University of Texas at Arlington is aiming for a solution that could be replicated across North Texas.

Officials will break ground on the new project on Friday afternoon.

Construction is already underway for Wynn Terrace Senior Cottage Community, an innovative, new affordable housing development in East Arlington that will focus on seniors.

Housing Channel

There is a big reason why a project like this is so important for seniors on fixed incomes.

Rising property taxes are pricing people out and so is the rent.

According to the Texas Affiliation of Affordable Housing Providers, the median income for Texas seniors on a fixed income is $25,601, but a renter must earn $46,889 annually to afford the current fair market rent of $1,200 for a two-bedroom apartment in North Texas. However, even many one bedrooms are much more than that.

The concern here is the baby boomers – the largest generation next to millennials – a majority of whom will reach 65 or older by 2030.

"73 million people – that's a huge population of people and there's really not a lot of housing available for people who are on fixed incomes,” said Donna VanNess, president of Housing Channel in Fort Worth. “It's a very scary thing and sometimes seniors who don't have the opportunity to continue working or don't have retirement, they basically age into poverty."

VanNess said she knows of families who are spending upwards of 50% to 60% of their monthly income on housing right now. The general rule is to not spend more than 30% of monthly income on housing or other needs could be compromised.

VanNess said in order to afford the median rent in North Texas, one must make $24 an hour. If they are earning only the minimum wage in Texas of $7.25, they would have to work 115 hours per paycheck.

“There has been a lot of inflation and property prices are rising. What's happening is our seniors are being displaced basically out of their own homes because their property taxes are so high that they really can't afford to continue to live in the home that they've had for a really long time and then there's also the problem of ongoing maintenance for that,” said VanNess. "I just want people to realize that we need to come together as a community to support each other and support projects like this. Because this is a really an economic issue. It's not just primarily a housing issue. And when we provide quality stable housing for people, then everybody thrives."

The new senior cottage community is aiming to serve as a model for implementing more affordable housing options in North Texas.

Located in East Arlington, the new “micro-community” will boast a dozen attractive one-bedroom homes under 600 square feet, each built to high-level energy performance standards, with half of the units reserved at below-market rental prices for seniors who meet lower-income guidelines. Other community amenities include individual patios, a landscaped community gathering space, and covered parking.

“It’s just a different housing option. We hope that this is an introduction and a model that can be emulated,” said VanNess. “The cottages are similar to what would be an efficiency apartment. They're detached but they're grouped into a community. So it helps with that isolation sometimes that seniors feel.”

Design and construction costs for the Wynn Terrace project are estimated at $1.5 million, which will be subsidized in part by $650,000 in federal Home Investments Partnerships funding.

The other interesting aspect of this project is the contribution from UT Arlington. Students from the UTA College of Architecture, Planning, and Public Affairs (CAPPA) helped design this community and the homes. The school will actually study this project and the efficiency of the homes, and use it as a blueprint for other potential affordable housing developments in North Texas.

"We've collaborated over the last four or five years and we've built three homes, all unique and innovative. So this time, this is our biggest project to date," said VanNess.

Housing Channel bought the land from the City of Arlington, which VanNess said has been integral in pushing the project forward.

The Wynn Terrace Senior Cottage Community is the latest achievement connected to the ongoing partnership between the City of Arlington and the 32-year-old community organization, which is dedicated to increasing access to affordable housing. Since the mid-2000s, Housing Channel has administered more than $4 million in federal funding to further Arlington’s affordable housing efforts, including distribution of down payment and closing cost assistance for low and moderate-income first-time homebuyers, rehabilitation of existing housing stock, construction of new single-family subdivisions, and free foreclosure prevention counseling and homeownership education for Arlington residents.

VanNess said that the organizations powering the Wynn Terrace development hope the project will be studied and replicated in other areas of Arlington and across the region.

“There is often negativity around the term ‘affordable housing,’ but the fact is that increased access to affordable housing benefits everyone, in the form of reduced homelessness and transiency, community members who have money back in their pockets they can spend with local businesses, and reduction of neighborhood blight,” said VanNess. “Innovative thinking, collaboration, and effective public policy are essential to addressing this critical community need.”

Other project contributors and donors include Acme Brick, Builders First Source, Ambit Polyurethane, Kelly Moore, Huber Engineered Woods, James Hardie Siding, and Tamlyn.

The new homes are expected to be available for rent by summer 2024. There is already a waitlist for the application process to live there.

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