Davis, CA – Missing in the discussion over the Village Farms project is the impact of shifting about 47 acres of developed land to habit preservation, while retaining the 1800-unit project, the result is what they are calling BRPA (Biological Resources Preservation Alternative) Equal Weight alternative results in densification of the remaining residential areas.
As staff notes, “The current… BRPA has removed approximately 47.1 total acres from the proposed development and preserves the designated biological resource area while retaining the 1,800 dwelling units as originally proposed. The BRPA increases the acreage of the Natural Habitat Area from 25.8 acres as originally proposed to 47.1 acres.”
As a result, there is a net increase of 360 missing middle units, an increase to 20 percent of affordable housing units (a net increase of 60), and “an adjustment to right size the Down Payment Assistance Homes unit count to achieve a higher level of affordability impact with a meaningful down payment assistance dollar amount for each of the 90 units, while still balancing the overall project financial feasibility in light of the above noted adjustments.”
The most dramatic part of this is that the number of market rate single-family homes drops from 680 down to 310. That means that only 17 percent of the overall units are now single-family market rate homes.
“We’re going up to 20%, which is as we all know above what the ordinance is,” Rochelle Swanson told the Council on Tuesday.
The one downside of the shift was the reduction of the number of Down Payment Assistance Homes from 310 down to 90.
Swanson explained that was “about keeping the project viable, being able to actually do a meaningful down payment, which is 75% of a required down payment for the mortgage.”
She added, “As you can imagine, losing 47.1 acres of market rate housing is going to have an impact. And so part of it was being able to move to affordable what is be able to keep the commitment to 1800 houses, but still also being able to do a down payment assistance program.”
She noted, “That’s not just a one-time down payment, that’s 15% of the purchase price that moves up as the market moves up when it gains equity. And when that house is sold, that 15% goes into this foundation, which is for all intents and purposes a housing trust fund that will help seed affordable housing programs throughout the city of Davis.”
She said, “This, this is an ongoing gift to the city through affordable housing.”
Because of the reduction of the developable land, keeping the project to 1800 units required a smaller lot size.
“We were able to lean in more heavily on the affordable by design, which would typically be what would be that missing middle and where income qualifications hit for those lower house prices,” Swanson explained. “Part of the goal that John (Whitcombe) was really looking at is how do we find a house price that’s comparable that somebody might decide to live in Woodland or live in Dixon or Sacramento or West Sacramento, and how do we try to target that?”
Swanson concluded, “Now obviously square foot to square foot is going to be more expensive in Davis where the most expensive housing area in all of the county that you can’t move. All you can do is try to adjust to that part.”
Its a great thing that they retreated from wanting to build on that potential vernal pool. We would have had an election ALL ABOUT THAT if they had stuck to their guns there…
Im wary however of what they mean by “affordable-by-design missing middle”. If that is still detached housing, its gonna be an “all-houses / no room for trees” kind of neighborhood like you see in the middle of the cannery. If it is townhomes / garden courts / cluster homes.. where you can get that kinda housing density while preserving a healthy amount of open space… then this woud be a significant improvement.
Your headline is untrue. Of the 1,440 units that are not Affordable rental apartments with restricted incomes, only 104 are attached (according to the developer’s testimony that 10% of the non-custom, for-sale products will be attached). All the rest are detached, single-family houses, and while there are 60 additional Affordable rental apartments, 200 market-rate rental apartments in the previous proposal have been eliminated in this round.
The detail is not trivial, because attached for-sale units (duplexes and townhouses) in Davis go for $450,000-$550,000, but our market makes it impossible to build a detached house, even if small and on a micro-lot, that’s worth less than $600,000. I suspect many of the planned detached houses at Village Farms that are not custom homes will in fact range up to our median price of $900,000—note that Bretton Woods is selling 2-bedroom, 2-bath houses starting at $750,000.
Because I have a son who teaches at Davis High, married to another teacher, I know our teachers cannot afford a $600,000 house, even with a 15% down payment subsidy.
In Davis, at least, duplexes and townhouses are the only forms of housing that can accurately be labeled “affordable by design,” and I would urge the developers to provide many more, even if it means more custom homes and pushing the total above 1,800. Meantime, I would also urge the use of accurate labels by the developer and others—the term “Missing Middle Housing” is very clearly defined (it is attached and affordable to no more than 125% median income), and only the attached units in the Village Farms proposal fit the definition.
I appreciate the developer’s wish to capture some of the folks who have bought houses elsewhere (my son lives in West Sacramento), but the resistance to duplexes and townhouses is an impediment to realizing any notable amount of “affordable by design/missing middle” housing. Simply labeling the units as such doesn’t make them so.
I welcome fact-checking (Zillow, median income data, teacher salaries, etc. are all among available information) as well as further clarification from the developer about numbers and sizes of different unit types they are proposing.
Alex Achimore
Some will never be satisfied
Some of the never satisfied are closeted obstructionists.