In Central Florida Housing Market, Affordable Housing Harder to Come By
After her divorce three years ago, Dawn Kirlew worried that she might end up living on the street. She couldn’t find a safe, affordable place for herself and her son to live.
Everywhere she looked, the rent for a two-bedroom, one-bath looked exceeded $1,000 a month. That would have taken up almost half her $25,000 salary.
“I was growing desperate, ” Kirlew said.
Then she found The Villages, a mixed-income complex near the Mall at Millenia that fit her budget. The 42-year-old moved right in.
But she may have been one of the lucky ones. As land prices escalate in the Central Florida housing market, and roads and schools become more crowded, developers are finding it harder to make the mixed-income concept work.
It has been an effective tool to help meet Central Florida’s acute housing affordability issue. Developers of communities of condos, rental apartments or a combination have set aside a percentage of the units at below-market rates for people with moderate incomes.
By using federal and state loans, as well as tax credits, developers such as The Villages’ Scott Culp, vice president of CED Construction, can still make a profit. But Culp’s Marbella project, set to break ground next month on North Goldenrod Road, may be the last of its kind for a while.
The infrastructure, housing experts say, can no longer support the growth of Orange County. Add on top of the Florida mortgages for home buyers, there are the escalating land costs for the developers themselves, and land for such projects becomes out of reach.
“We have two issues that compete in our community: the need for affordable housing, and school and transportation concurrency rules. It’s difficult to get a site that meets all of the regulations,” Culp said.
In most of unincorporated Orange County, where poorly-rated roads abound, that translates into a halt on additional apartment buildings and units up for purchase on the Florida condo market, which pack in more people than single-family homes.
“It’s a Catch-22,” said Mitch Glasser, the county’s housing and development manager. “On the one hand, you don’t want to overcrowd schools and overburden roads, but the need for affordable housing is real. I really don’t know what the answer is.”
As Florida mortgage costs raise the burden of home ownership higher than many residents can bear, the task force of developers and county officials is studying the problem.
Orange County Commissioner Mildred Fernandez, who worked closely with Culp, said that it was imperative to keep workforce housing projects from going extinct. She challenged fellow commissioners to work more diligently toward a solution.
“These are the people that work the hardest and are among the most needed to keep our community afloat,” Fernandez said. “They deserve to be able to live in a good place.”
The $36 million Marbella will have Mediterranean features, as well as an ornamental fountain near the main entrance. At least 40 percent of the condominiums and apartment units will be set below fair market value for people making 60 percent or less than the area’s median income.
In 2006, that was $34,440 for a family of four.
The first construction phase of Marbella is scheduled for completion early next year. Experts predict that Florida mortgage loans will remain at or around their current levels throughout 2007 and possibly beyond.
