NeahCasa

The Financial Side – Or How To Get the Dang Things Built

• Government Subsidized Construction – This is how most affordable housing gets on the ground. We’ve listed the programs we know about.  It’s a challenging maze, and especially difficult to make it "pencil out" at the coast, but we do have expert help in our region to call upon.

• Project Related Investment (PRI) - Some private foundations are now making their endowments work for the community by investing in projects that help with land banking and housing development. Two that we know of are Meyer Memorial Trust and Enterprise Foundation.

• Local Government Funding and Incentives for Housing – There is much that local jurisdictions can do if they have the will and ingenuity. Check out the lists for ideas.

• Local Community Investment  -  Creating new models of personal investment has huge potential in a community like ours.  NeahCasa intends to be pioneering in this realm and has lots of ideas. 

• “Free” Land Acquisition Methods – Tourism-impacted land prices make it very challenging for standard affordable housing methods to “pencil out” in increasing numbers of rural areas (see Coastal Gap).   Innovative use of tax credits tied with upzoning, incentives to developers, and other creative win-win strategies can provide land for housing development at little or no cost to the community.

• “Finance-Free” Strategies  - Conventional financing constitutes a cost of housing equal or greater than the cost of the homes themselves.  Removing whole segments of community housing from finance treadmills over a 25 year period by paying off Community Land Trust ownership of the homes can reduce homeowner qualification expenses as well as the financing costs themselves.