Mountain Towns Feel Pandemic Pinch
Stegner is a big believer in marketing all the skills, attributes, and accolades you can when looking for affordable housing partners. “Communities really need to think about what they can provide in terms of incentives to encourage the development of more properties,” she says. “Look at your zoning laws, look at your tax credits, which will always be limited. Think about how you can promote other ways of doing things differently to be cost-effective and allow for low area median income households to rent more units.”
This has become a necessity in regions like El Paso County, where Stegner’s Partners in Housing is based. She notes about 45 percent of country households are cost-burdened, meaning they’re paying more than 30 percent of AMI on housing or, in severe cases, more than 50 percent. “El Paso is really suffering because wages are lower than Denver metro, but housing costs are about the same,” she says. “It takes time to build new housing, and it’s very costly to build new. Folks who own naturally occurring affordable housing properties are also selling to organizations from other states that convert the properties to market-rate properties.
Article by Nelli Day
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