BizSense Beat is a weekly collaboration between VPM News and Richmond BizSense that brings you the top business stories during NPR's Morning Edition on Fridays.
Here’s a recap of the top stories for the week of December 6, 2023:
An affordable housing boom? Plans for thousands of income-based units show sector’s momentum in Richmond
Reported by Richmond Bizsense’s Mike Platania
In the spring of 2023, Richmond declared a housing crisis caused by a dearth of inventory and rising prices for residents.
In the months since that declaration, the city has found itself – due to a variety of factors – in what is arguably a boom of affordable housing proposals that could bring thousands of new income-based units to the area.
Local and out-of-town players alike have filed plans for at least 2,800 units for lower-income renters in recent months. That’s after years of market-rate apartment developments being far and away the most common type of new multifamily construction in the city.
One example of the trend is Nashville-based developer Elmington’s proposal to build 266 low income units in Swansboro and 400 in Northside.
Another national developer, Standard Communities, is planning 236 income-restricted rental townhomes in South Richmond near the Chippenham Parkway-Midlothian Turnpike interchange, and an additional 124 units are in the works about a mile away.
Locally based Lynx Ventures is looking to round out its phased New Manchester Flats development with a 127-unit building for renters with lower incomes, while also planning 400 affordable units elsewhere in South Richmond and finishing work on 200 such units near Chippenham Hospital.
Though the boom has been happening mostly in the city limits, Henrico County is also in on the trend, most notably via Spy Rock Real Estate and Crescent Development’s planned redevelopment of the 32-acre Glenwood Farms complex into around 1,000 low-income units. That’s in addition to the nearly 350 units that Spy Rock and Crescent, two developers that have historically built market-rate apartments, are planning in South Richmond.
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