Seattle’s total narrowly edged out New York City, which produced 14,240 affordable apartments in the same time period from 2020 to 2024, and Austin, Texas, which produced 13,342. Minnesota’s Twin Cities metro came in fourth with 10,722 apartments produced, followed by Atlanta, Denver, Los Angeles, and the “Bay Area.”

Note: San Francisco (along with the North Bay) was broken out a separate category from the East and South Bay Area in this study. Combined, the two Bay Area listings accounted for 16,301 affordable apartments, a total which would have led the list.

RentCafe’s analysis included only apartments in 100% affordable buildings, which does leave out a small subset of the data from mixed-income buildings. The study only counted apartments, not affordable homeownership projects, which also represents a small fraction of overall production.

With the growth in production, affordable apartments are a growing share of overall apartment production. “Affordable housing for renters accounted for one-quarter of the [Seattle] metro’s total of 59,000 new apartment buildings during this time,” RentCafe’s Florin Petrut noted.

Affordable housing composed 31.7% of overall apartments in New York over the past five years, since the region produced fewer apartments than Seattle. New York’s share trailed only San Francisco, where over a third of apartments were affordable since 2020. San Francisco produced fewer total apartment units than any other top 20 city, while Seattle outpaced the vastly larger New York market by nearly one-third.

For some regions the uptick in affordable housing was dramatic, but less so for Seattle, where the five-year time period was up nearly 40% over the previous five years — one of the smallest increases in the dataset. That means Seattle’s affordable housing sector was also the leader over the entire decade, not just the last five years. Metro Seattle produced more than 24,000 affordable apartments over the decade.

Most metros have momentum in affordable sector

On the other hand, if trendlines continue for fast-building metros, Seattle could get its title stolen in the decade ahead. For example, San Antonio’s affordable housing production was up 222%, Phoenix’s was up 206%, and New York City was up 185%. Although, in Phoenix’s case, that still amounted to just 4,626 affordable apartments, which shows how anemic affordable construction had been previously.

“Notably, affordable housing is starting to make up a larger portion of all new apartment construction,” Petrut noted. “In 2024, nearly 14% of all new apartments were income-restricted — up from just under 9% ten years earlier — indicating a growing emphasis on affordability in new development.”

A few regions bucked that trend, and continue to emphasize market-rate apartment development to a large degree. For example, just 5% of the more than 107,000 apartments produced in the Dallas metro from 2020 to 2024 were income-restricted affordable units. The Chicagoland area also produced just over 107,000 apartments, and just 6.6% were affordable. Houston did not even crack the top 20, despite being the sixth-most populous metro in the country.

Nationwide, 2024 was a banner year, delivering 91,000 affordable units, the highest total in decades. “Nearly 310,000 affordable apartments have been built nationwide since 2020, accounting for 12.6% of all new apartment buildings,” Petrut wrote. “Affordable housing construction rose 73% compared to 2015–2019, outpacing overall apartment building growth.”

Part of the credit for the affordable housing surge goes to the pandemic response strategy engineered under President Joe Biden: “The American Rescue Plan has helped move things forward by directing billions of dollars into housing through State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds,” Petrut wrote. “On top of that, many states introduced or expanded their own tax credit programs. These efforts helped developers cover rising costs and move projects across the finish line faster while simultaneously keeping rents affordable for the long term.”

How Seattle invests in affordable housing

Seattle goes beyond many other American cities in directly funding affordable housing production. The City of Seattle is spending nearly $350 million per year on affordable housing, which comes from a variety of revenue sources.

Since the 1980s, the Seattle Housing Levy has augmented affordable housing creation. The 2023 renewal tripled the size of the levy to a $970 million seven-year package, and it passed by a wide margin. At its new level, the levy provides $139 million in annual funding.

In 2020, Seattle also passed the “JumpStart” payroll tax on the largest companies in the city. Initially the revenue stream provided Covid relief, but over the longer-term the tax was intended to focus a majority of investments on affordable housing — at least when mayors and councils aren’t raiding it to plug budget holes and fund pet projects. The payroll tax pulled in $360 million in 2024, but only $142 million of that ended up going to the Office of Housing, a figure which was further cut in 2025.

Seattle’s Mandatory Housing Affordability or MHA program — an inclusionary zoning regime that traded upzones allowing larger apartment buildings for new affordability requirements — also raises affordable housing funds via in-lieu payments from builders who opt out of providing income-restricted homes on-site. As a developer fee, MHA revenue is volatile and varies with the pace of construction activity, which has been slowing recently in Seattle, especially in the office sector. MHA topped out at $74 million in collections in 2021, but has declined since, settling out around $22 million in 2025 and in 2026 projections.

In 2025, Seattle voters approved another dedicated revenue source, this time focused on social housing. An “excess compensation” tax hitting high earners who make more than $1 million per year is expected to raise more than $50 million annually for the recently launched Seattle Social Housing Developer, which is pursuing a mixed-income model popularized in cities like Vienna.

Other jurisdictions in the region lag far behind Seattle in affordable housing investments, but most are taking strides to boost production. The Washington State Legislature has also steadily grown the size of the state Housing Trusting Fund, setting a new record with $400 million allocated in 2024, which has also helped get more affordable housing projects off the ground.

King County has flirted with a billion-dollar bond for workforce housing — although it’s not clear how soon such an initiative could materialize after a study found the County would need to back the bonds with a dedicated funding source or risk its general fund.

The region’s largest employers — including Amazon and Microsoft — have also made large pledges of housing grants and low-interest loans to aid nonprofit builders. Two top executives at Microsoft and Amazon shared a Seattle Times op-ed byline this week arguing the state “must make it easier to build our way out of the housing crisis” — and touting that “together, our two companies have committed $1.6 billion to preserve and build more than 26,000 affordable homes.”

Growth in affordable housing production has also brought its own problems. By 2025, vacancy rates at affordable apartments in King County had climbed above 10%, which is reportedly threatening to bankrupt some buildings and providers and has already led to bailouts. While demand remains high for low income housing, overproduction in the higher income segments (e.g., around 60% of area median income) has emerged an issue, at least in some parts of the region.

Still not enough

Leading the nation in affordable housing production is a feather in Seattle’s cap, but local housing advocates would be the first to admit it’s far from enough. In 2018, King County’s Affordable Housing Task Force projected that the county would need to add 244,000 net new affordable homes by 2040.

“According to our estimates, we need 156,000 more affordable homes today and another 88,000 affordable homes by 2040 to ensure that no low-income or working households are cost burdened,” the task force wrote. “That means we need to build, preserve or subsidize a total of 244,000 net new homes by 2040 if we are to ensure that all low-income families in King County have a safe and healthy home that costs less than 30 percent of their income.”

To meet the goal would have required a 11,000 affordable homes per year pace, which the region has not met thus far, even with its nation-leading production. To make up for its slow start out of the gates, King County would need to average 15,000 net new affordable homes annually from 2026 through 2040 to meet its target.

And state leaders are projecting that solving the housing crisis will also take robust market-rate production, setting a target of 1 million additional housing units over the next 20 years, or 50,000 per year. 

More work remains to hit housing targets, and simply outproducing peer cities may not be enough, if Seattle wants to solve its affordability crisis.

The post Seattle Leads Nation in Affordable Apartment Production first appeared on The Urbanist.

In fact, Moore delivered a slow-growth manifesto, tinged with derision for renters, who she portrayed an unengaged and a detriment to neighborhoods.

“Too many of our young people cannot afford to live in a city, and this is what’s driving a lot of this,” Moore said. “And yet they are told, ‘if you just let us have a free rein and build, you’ll be able to afford, you’ll be able to have housing.’ It’s not true. It is an economic justice issue, and so allowing free-range zoning is not going to get you into the home that you want. It’s not going to create the ownership opportunity that you need to grow your wealth to have create a stable society where people are engaged socially and politically. What we’re talking about is building high-end townhouses and lots of rentals. Rentals are not stable.”

Moore singled out the Maple Leaf neighborhood center (where she lives) as one she’d seek to roll back in particular, citing neighbor concerns, transit service she characterized as substandard, and her “two formal requests to the mayor’s office to remove it.”

“I’m not prepared to sacrifice this particular neighborhood and reason that I live here and support this neighborhood so that we can just throw a bunch of townhouses up that start at $700,000,” Moore said.

Later in the meeting, Councilmember Dan Strauss (District 6) encouraged his colleagues seeking to remove neighborhood centers to propose zoning changes that add housing elsewhere in their respective districts in order to maintain the principle of shared commitment to addressing the housing crisis and welcoming neighbors.

Moore: Urbanists are lying

Moore’s speech was loaded with anti-developer sentiment, claims that homebuilders and urbanists are lying, and insinuations that affordable housing providers have been manipulated to be on their side. She questioned the very concept of density. The comments echoed those she made last year at King County’s Housing Affordability Committee, which levied significant criticism of Harrell’s initial growth plan as not going far enough in encouraging affordability.

“So, we also need to challenge this statement that density is going to produce what people are seeking,” Moore said. “When I talk to young people, they want a place of their own. They want a little garden. They want the amenities that us current homeowners have, and we’re creating a false promise with what we’re putting out here and what the urbanist people are telling us, and what the homebuilding association is telling us, and even some of the affordable housing providers, who desperately need more affordable housing and have had to — because of the structure of the Mandatory Housing Affordability act — have had to try to have allegiance to them.”

The Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) program is Seattle’s version of inclusionary zoning, which means that all new multifamily housing contributes to affordable housing creation be either paying a fee into the City’s affordable housing trust fund or setting aside homes as affordable on-site. The MHA requirements were paired with upzones increasing housing capacity and enacted into law in 2019 across Seattle’s 27 urban villages (which are being renamed urban centers in the new comprehensive plan). So far, new single-family homes — despite being the most expensive type of housing in the city — have been exempt from MHA contributions or upzones.

Due to a statewide middle housing minimum standard, single family zones will no longer be exempt from upzones, with fourplexes set to be allowed citywide and sixplexes near major transit. The mayor’s direction on MHA requirements in these zones is not yet clear, but he seems to be leaning against applying them, hoping to avoid a drag on development. Townhome builders have smaller margins and less access to capital compared to large multifamily builders. Overall, Seattle housing production has remained strong following MHA passage, with the city likely setting a housing production record in 2024, driven mostly by apartment construction.

Moore accurately identified that the Harrell’s plan is focused on townhomes, but her assertion that $700,000 townhomes are not a welcome addition across many neighborhoods where single family homes easily cost more than $1 million is less certain, and family-sized housing options are scant otherwise. Moreover, her preferred alternative — apparently housing co-ops — hardly appears ready to be scaled up as a major housing option to be relied upon by Seattle’s middle class.

Outside of relying on the private market, the route to expanding low-income homes and family-sized middle housing would require subsidy and thus considerable public investment. It’s unclear where that public investment would be found at scale. Moore and her colleagues (besides the recently departed Morales) backed a City budget in November that raided more than $300 million in JumpStart revenues (largely set aside for affordable housing) in order to fund Council’s priorities and close a shortfall without raising new revenue.

When Moore was running for office in 2023, she told The Urbanist she was grateful for the new state mandate pushing the city to allow additional density, and said she was in favor of either the most transformative growth option that the Harrell Administration was studying — alternative five — or an even more ambitious alternative six that many housing advocates had been pushing the city to study. “If we have diversity of housing including duplexes, triplexes, quadplexes and apartments in all neighborhoods, I think ultimately that makes us healthier,” she told Crosscut shortly before the election.

Getting up to speed on housing plans

Meanwhile, Councilmember Rob Saka sought a primer on the basics of comprehensive planning, growth management, and housing economics from Seattle Office of Planning and Community Development (OPCD) senior staff, but also shared some criticisms of the process. The newly installed chair of the Select Committee on the Comprehensive Plan, Joy Hollingsworth (District 3), urged councilmembers to do their homework and get basic questions answered during office hours rather than derailing meetings. This advice Saka quickly ignored.

The former chair of the committee, District 2 Councilmember Tammy Morales, resigned from the city council effective January 6, citing ostracization and mistreatment by her colleagues. Morales was the only councilmember with an urban planning background.

Organized homeowner group opposition has picked up as the One Seattle plan has neared the finish line. Dozens turned out during public comment Monday — many sharing similar talking points, such as the assertion that new housing would jeopardize Puget Sound’s resident Orca whale population. It’s unclear how the next 100,000 people added to the Puget Sound region would threaten marine ecosystems in a way that the four million residents and their two million cars (with tires that emit particles toxic to the salmon resident Orca rely on) don’t already.

OPCD shared a timeline that calls for passing the first phase of the Comprehensive Plan legislation in May, which would square the city with state middle housing mandates. OPCD split the plan into a second phase that adds the new neighborhood centers and expansions of existing urban centers, which may prove to be the more controversial half. OPCD hopes to pass phase two in September.

District 7 Councilmember Bob Kettle, a former leader with the Queen Anne Community Council, noted the City should expect legal challenges that could delay the plan, alluding to the group’s appeal that delayed backyard cottage reform by several years, among others. Both Rivera and Kettle stressed that the City should have factored that risk into their timeline.

"I'm from Queen Anne, I know groups like to appeal," CM Bob Kettle says of the potential for the city's Comp Plan to be subject to an appeal at the hearing examiner. If you'd like to unpack that comment… www.theurbanist.org/2018/10/26/w…

— Ryan Packer (@typewriteralley.bsky.social) January 6, 2025 at 11:35 AM

Rivera pressed OPCD top brass on the reasons why the Comprehensive Plan was so behind schedule, with the Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) not even out yet (it’s expected by the end of the month). OPCD Director Rico Quirindongo and Long Range Planning Manager Michael Hubner both repeated the phrase “a lot of moving parts” a few times, but neither gave a satisfying answer for Rivera.

Behind the scenes, it appears OPCD and the Mayor’s Office not being on the same page about the plan initially in 2023 set back the release of the Draft EIS, as The Urbanist’s reporting revealed in April. Public records show Harrell’s team halved the number of neighborhood centers in the plan, vastly scaled back transit corridor upzones, and questioned the need for ending parking mandates citywide, as neighboring Shoreline recently approved to curb housing costs. Given the lack of mayoral buy-in, OPCD redid their draft plan.

Nonetheless, housing advocates have largely rallied around the Mayor’s plan, noting the improvements it makes over the status quo. The Mayor also added five more neighborhood centers to the plan and loosened multiplex size restrictions in October, responding to advocates and increasing housing opportunities. Compared with the backsliding homeowner groups (and some councilmembers) are seeking, it looks preferable.

The next Select Committee on the Comprehensive Plan meeting is January 15th at 2pm, with a whole schedule of meetings laid out through May on the committee webpage. An evening public hearing on February 5 will be an opportunity for Seattleites who aren’t free on a Monday morning to weigh in.

The post Moore Leads Housing Backlash in Seattle Council’s First Comprehensive Plan Meeting first appeared on The Urbanist.

On Tuesday, amidst a deep housing affordability crisis, the outgoing Seattle City Council is setting the stage for a new fee to make building homes in Seattle even more expensive. 

This homebuilder fee — a “transportation impact fee” — threatens to hamper housing production, reduce funding for affordable housing, and deter development in areas with frequent transit service and good access to jobs and amenities. While we need more investment in Seattle’s multimodal transportation infrastructure, this is the wrong time and the wrong place for transportation impact fees on new development.

Housing starts are down, impact fees could make it worse

The timing of the proposed transportation impact fees could not be worse. With high interest rates and construction costs, home-builders are already finding it nearly impossible to make new housing projects financially feasible. While the skyline is still filled with cranes from developments started years ago, the city’s data shows applications for new apartment construction permits have plummeted, down from 11,200 between January and September of 2020 to just 2,600 between that same timeframe this year.  

Adding another fee on top of these challenges will limit new housing supply, exacerbating our existing shortage of all types of homes. Economic analysis commissioned by the Mobility Coalition projects that transportation impact fees imposed under the proposed amendment would reduce housing production by 15-17%. This reduction will worsen the housing shortage that fuels rising rents, displacement, and homelessness. 

To be clear, we believe transportation impact fees can be a helpful tool for suburban and rural jurisdictions to pay for infrastructure needs from new development, when there’s no conflict with other critical public goals. That is not the case in Seattle. Building homes close to jobs, amenities, and services reduces people’s need to drive long distances. It allows more people to get around by walking, transit, or cycling. Transportation impact fees risk displacing growth to outlying areas with fewer transportation options, increasing reliance on cars, adding to traffic congestion, and forcing our region to spend millions more in road and highway infrastructure to compensate.

Uncertain revenue with blowback potential

Finally, by disincentivizing development activity, any revenue generated by potential transportation impact fees may be offset by losses from other city revenue sources. The Real Estate Excise Tax (REET) is one of the major local sources of funding for transportation, and collections are driven by property sales and new development. REET revenues have declined precipitously and are projected to decline 10% more in 2023.

Construction also contributes to our sales and B&O tax revenues, both of which are predicted to continue to decline due to the industry-wide slowdown. And because of Mandatory Housing Affordability — which requires private developers to either include affordable apartments in new buildings or pay a fee to the Office of Housing — slowdowns in development activity will directly reduce funding available for affordable housing for low-income families. 

Seattle needs more homes to address our affordability crisis. Instead of adopting another fee that will add costs to home-builders and worsen the housing shortage, the Council should lead with the mayor on ways to help the city recover from the pandemic and catalyze the additional economic activity and housing production we need. 

We need to build on the resounding success of the Seattle Housing Levy renewal by increasing all sources of funding for affordable housing, streamlining permitting, and investing in the Downtown Activation Plan. Furthermore, the future city council should align discussions on funding transportation infrastructure projects with an existing tool, the nine-year transportation levy, set for renewal next year. By adopting a holistic approach and fostering collaboration, we can make meaningful strides in addressing the housing affordability crisis while supporting sustainable transportation investments.

Take action!

You can reach your councilmembers by emailing them at council@seattle.gov or testifying at the City Council meeting at 2pm Tuesday November 21 either in-person or electronically. The sign-up form opens at noon. It’s a packed agenda with impact fees pretty far down the list, so the public comment session may go late in the meeting

This article is a cross-post from The Stranger, where it originally appeared.

The post Op-Ed: Seattle Council Is Trying to Make Housing More Expensive first appeared on The Urbanist.

Using lawsuits and an aggressive opposition campaign in Seattle’s design review process, a small group of condominium owners has delayed construction of more than 3,000 units of housing downtown — and blocked $39.4 million in funding for the city’s affordable housing efforts.

An analysis by The Urbanist found that nine major housing developments in the downtown core have been stalled in design review, appeals to the hearing examiner, and lawsuits. All nine projects, if completed, would add significant contributions to the city’s Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) program — ranging from $2 million to $6.5 million per project.

One of the most active opponents to these new apartment projects is the association of condominium owners at Escala, a 31-story luxury tower built in 2010 at the intersection of Fourth Avenue and Virginia Street. In the past year, the Escala homeowners’ association has filed several lawsuits and appealed decisions by the Seattle Department of Constructions and Inspections (SDCI). It has aggressively commented in design review hearings for years, going so far as to hire a communications consultant, Megan Kruse, who frequently makes written and verbal comments on neighboring projects.

Kruse, who is not a resident of Escala, but has lived downtown for more than 40 years, told The Urbanist her client isn’t opposed to all nearby tower projects, but rather wants developers to mitigate impacts such as competing alleyway access, delivery and garbage truck traffic, and the loss of light to surrounding buildings.

“There are no guaranteed views,” Kruse said in a phone interview. “You can’t be the last one on the block. But everything should be weighed and balanced when it comes to the cumulative impacts. If you’re going to build this really huge 1,000-person building and not include a loading berth, there’s something wrong with that.” 

The project Kruse was referring to is a proposed 44-story, 550-unit apartment building at 2005 5th Avenue, across Virginia Street from Escala. During a design review meeting about the project on Tuesday evening, Kruse made comments taking issue with what she said were insufficient facilities in the alley for deliveries and garbage pickup. She presented a variety of slides asking for a redesign, citing a list of dangers ranging from national freight-related injury statistics to the climate impacts of delivery vans.

In its deliberations, the downtown design review board rejected Kruse’s criticisms, and voted unanimously to move the project forward.

Escala has also raised the issue of delivery trucks in design review comments and lengthy email correspondence with SDCI Director Nathan Torgelson regarding another nearby project, a 44-story tower with 461 apartments at 2025 5th Avenue. 

When asked to comment on delay tactics in the design review process, SDCI spokesperson Bryan Stevens wrote in an email, “[Design review] is not intended to be a vehicle for delay, but some may use it to challenge issues beyond the basis of a decision to cause delay or invoke a settlement. Our staff work to file motions for dismissal of appeals deemed to be erroneous or without merit.”

SDCI is currently holding a stakeholder review of the design review process and will make its recommendations soon, Stevens said. He said Mayor Harrell and Councilmember Dan Strauss are awaiting those findings before introducing legislation that would reform the design review process, including exempting design review from affordable housing projects or projects that contribute to the MHA fund. Also proposed in the legislation is a two-year pilot program allowing all multifamily housing projects to select internal SDCI administrative review over design review.

Brady Nordstrom, coordinator for Seattle For Everyone, said in an email to The Urbanist that “we believe that it’s time to fix Seattle’s design review as a specific bottleneck in the housing pipeline. Design review has become slower and more unpredictable in recent years.”

Twitter user @asher_971 drew attention to the delay issue in January, writing in a post about the stalled tower projects: “that’s hundreds of construction jobs, millions in MHA payments, and thousands of residents + potential shoppers + foot traffic blocked over concerns about historic preservation, views, lighting, noise, parking, and traffic.”

In addition to making comments, Escala hasn’t been shy about taking the city to court to oppose neighboring projects. It filed lawsuits against two proposed nearby developments at 1903 5th Avenue (a hotel-apartment complex with 229 units of housing) and 1933 5th Avenue (a hotel-apartment complex with 431 units of housing). The two projects, which have been stalled since 2016 and 2017, would together make an estimated contribution of $12.75 million to the city’s MHA program if built.

In December, the Washington state supreme court refused to hear both of Escala’s lawsuits against the two projects on Fifth Avenue. In a bracingly strong statement from the Seattle city attorneys arguing the case, they wrote, “Escala again failed to demonstrate any substantial public interest in their run-of-the mill ‘Not In My Backyard’ (‘NIMBY’) claims.”

Escala’s lawyers moved to strike that language from the court record, but the judge denied this request.

Arguing against the project, Escala’s attorneys claimed that shadows from the new buildings would result in “cancers, cardiovascular disease, metabolic disorders and mental health [sic].” The court rejected those claims, largely because of state legislation passed in 2022 that limits the use of State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA) challenges to housing projects based on concerns over aesthetics and light — in addition to provisions passed in 2019 limiting appeals based on traffic impacts. 

Meanwhile, a bill moving forward in the legislature introduced by Representative Amy Walen (D-48, Bellevue) would ban design review for housing projects statewide. 

“Problems with design review have recently become more well-known as evidenced by the multiple state bills seeking to reform the process,” Nordstrom said in an email. “We are enthusiastic about the growing public and political will to fix design review to be more inclusive, predictable, and efficient.”

In one of the cases before the state supreme court, city attorneys gave a shout out to the new state law limiting SEPA appeals: “In June 2022, at the urging of advocates who described how meritless SEPA appeals had delayed sorely needed housing projects, the legislature expanded the exemption to bar appeals based on alleged impacts to aesthetic and light as well.”

Escala isn’t the only opponent of new apartment towers downtown. In October, residents of the Madison Tower at 1000 First Avenue and the Seattle Historic Waterfront Association filed a lawsuit against the city, challenging a 17-floor, 245-unit apartment building replacing a surface parking lot at 1101 Western Avenue. The project would add nearly $2 million to the city’s MHA affordable housing coffers.

In August 2022, a group called the Belltown Livability Coalition filed an appeal against a Master Use Permit the city granted to a proposed 19-story, 181-unit apartment building at 2616 Western Avenue. The group’s website complains that the project, which would add $2.4 million to the city’s affordable housing fund, would end up “cluttering our skyline, cutting off light to the surroundings [sic] buildings, and modifying our city plan without our input.”

And condo owners in Fischer Studio, a 28-unit historic building constructed in 1918, have filed an appeal against a 46-story, 531-unit apartment tower at 1516 Second Avenue.

It turns out Megan Kruse lives at Fischer Studio and has, not surprisingly, been very active in opposing the project. 

Attorneys for Fischer Studio, in their appeal to the hearing examiner, claimed the nearby apartment tower would impact neighbors “through the nearly complete elimination of natural daylight in private residences, health impacts associated with loss of light, loss of privacy, loss of air quality, wind, and safety impacts associated with the proposal’s overuse of the alley, which will likely interfere with access, emergency response efforts should they arise, and put the health, life, and safety of residents of the Fischer Studio Building in jeopardy.”

In her interview with the Urbanist, Kruse echoed these dire concerns. “So there’s people going to be staring at our bedroom and living room windows 16 feet across the alley,” she said. “We had a study done, and 40% of the units will have the amount of light available in a movie theater, 365 days a year.”

Developers of the nearby tower, which was originally proposed in January 2019 before the onset of the pandemic, have guided the project through four years of design review, an appeal to the hearing examiner and a lawsuit from Fischer Studio. The project, if completed, would add $5.125 million to the city’s affordable housing efforts.

On Wednesday, February 21, the Washington state court of appeals rejected Fischer Studio’s suit, largely based on the new state law limiting SEPA challenges. The judge also observed that Fischer’s complaints about Seattle’s guidelines not being applied strictly had little legal merit, noting: “The ‘guidelines’ are not ordinances. They are not rules regulating the improvement, development, modification, maintenance, or use of real property. Fischer does not identify any law that requires the enforcement of the guidelines.”

For her part, Kruse would like the city to have even more stringent guidelines. “I think the reason there are all these challenges is because there are no firm rules. There are no standards that people can rely on,” she said, arguing that city residents want more assurances. “So that I’m not going to be all of a sudden living in a basement apartment because somebody decided not to be nice.”

The post Lawsuits Block Thousands of Downtown Seattle Homes, $39 Million for Affordable Housing first appeared on The Urbanist.

MBAKS reported a decline in project applications from 450 in 2018 to 289 in 2020 and then anticipated only 139 projects in 2021. The report goes on to argue policymakers should be alarmed and the Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) program may be a primary culprit. MHA requires new development to build below-market housing on-site or pay a fee, potentially increasing construction costs. The policy was designed to offset this cost with increased building height, but townhome builders often argue the market doesn’t want four-story townhomes that MHA’s extra floor of height allowance made possible.

What was built

A narrative about declining townhome production is complicated by current development numbers. Project applications provide the most advanced leading indicator of construction but they don’t always translate to what is built. At the time of application, unit counts may be wrong. Building typologies may also be reclassified. Overall the number of projects may not be indicative of the number of units built. Representatives from Seattle Department of Construction and Inspections (SCDI) cautioned against drawing strong conclusions from project applications. But still, project applications are one of the few leading indicators we have and the trend is very clear, project applications are down.

Looking at the city’s reporting dashboard tells another story about more immediate trends.

2021 was a huge year for townhomes, nearly 50% more townhomes completed than any other year. This appears to have complicated the narrative that MHA is to blame for the project application decline. 2021 numbers include many projects permitted before MHA implementation which may account for the peak, builders potentially rushing to submit permits. Still 2022 will have many fewer applications filed prior to MHA, yet this year is on pace to see more townhomes built than any year besides 2021 and 2019.

Caution is warranted. We may still see a slowdown as predicted. Cameron McKinnon, a Seattle townhome builder and partner with Confluence Development LLC, seeing similar indicators and said, “I’m expecting the beginning of the downward trend for unit delivery this year,” suggesting builders have about a 2.5 to 3 year window from application to listing. This timeline suggests a decline at the end of 2022 but also makes it harder to disentangle the causes. MHA was put into law in March 2019. Since 2019 we’ve seen the pandemic, dramatic changes in construction costs and additional land use changes, such as the easing of ADU restrictions. Plus, interest rates have recently jumped, which shrinks the buying power of prospective townhome owners.

More than one source suggested townhome builders could be switching to other products.

“A lot of builders have shifted product types from building townhomes to building ADUS and DADUs,” McKinnon said. Issued permits suggest this is the case, trending way up for ADUs and DADUs since 2019.

But overall, detached home and accessory unit production is lower than prior to MHA’s implementation. This is true even in 2021, when a record number of total units were built. It appears like there’s a downward trend for these types of homes even though many are in areas exempt from MHA. The policy still doesn’t cover areas formerly designated as single family zoning, which may make those areas more attractive for development comparatively.

It’s hard to prove a counter-factual: without MHA would there have been more townhome construction? Aliesha Ruiz, Seattle Government Affairs Manager at MBAKS, reiterated what she’s hearing and what MBAKS reported. Referring to the townhome builders represented by MBAKS, she said “a large percentage of them have pivoted from building townhomes to buildings ADUs and DADUs because of MHA.”

It’s undeniable that many townhomes completed in 2021 were permitted before MHA implementation. But many weren’t and even fewer in 2022 were permitted before MHA went into effect.

But the general understanding from builders is clear. Ruiz said, “They tell me all day every day how it’s impossible to build townhomes.” And since the report was published in 2021, MBAKS has continued to track permit applications, noting the trend has continued.

SDCI provided project application data through April of 2022 to The Urbanist, and it suggested townhouse applications might be up from the 2021 trough but the numbers are still well below their peak. Any potential uptick, is too small to see a trend. Regardless, there appears to be general concern about townhouse production. New legislation was voted out of committee last week to further ease townhome production though it didn’t address MBAKS’s concerns about MHA requirements.

Overall, a dramatic decline in townhouse production hasn’t materialized yet, despite the leading permit indicators. The summer of 2023 will likely provide definitive data. Additionally, overall housing production is up since MHA implementation. Townhouse production set a record in 2021 and 2022 appears to be outpacing many years prior to MHA implementation.

The post Despite Slowdown Worries, 2021 Sets A Townhouse Production Record in Seattle first appeared on The Urbanist.

42% of residents also said that housing affordability was an issue that affected members of their family, while only 16% of respondents said that they had been able to easily find housing in Bellevue that both met their needs and was affordable.

The poll results also give hints as to what solutions residents expect from their city council in addressing the problem. Asked to choose between a “hands-on approach” that would incentivize or require the construction of affordable units versus a “hands-off approach” more reliant on the private market, 65% of residents polled preferred the hands-on approach compared to 19% who preferred the hands-off approach. Furthermore, an overwhelming 78% of Bellevue residents support requiring developers to reserve a percentage of units in new housing projects to be affordable, with exactly half (50%) of residents strongly supporting the approach. This policy, known as inclusionary zoning, is already used by Bellevue’s Eastside neighbors of Kirkland and Redmond.

In a press release, Executive Director of Housing Development Consortium Patience Malaba commented, “The results of the poll confirm that passing policies to effectively address the affordable housing challenges is a top priority for Bellevue residents…We know that housing is the solution, more affordable housing. We must match policy action on affordable housing to the scale of the problem to build thousands of affordable homes.”

Anna Fahey, communications director for Sightline Institute, noted, “Washington state’s housing shortage is affecting all our communities, driving up rent and home prices, and pushing people away from their jobs to longer, costlier commutes. People in Bellevue are feeling it personally, so it’s not surprising that survey respondents signaled strong support for a range of actions to rein in costs and allow more affordable home choices. The upshot is that they want action to address affordability and they are open to all kinds of solutions to make it happen.”

During a press conference at Crossroads Community Center on Monday morning, Executive Director of Eastside For All Debbie Lacy shared stories of residents’ housing experiences that had been captured in the poll. “One survey respondent in the 35-49 year old age bracket who grew up in Bellevue and is a renter said, ‘I make good money but still can’t afford even a starter home in Bellevue. Housing prices are going up faster than my ability to make more money and save for a down payment. Even though I am making more money every year. I feel shut out of the city I grew up in.'”

Regional rises in Puget Sound rents and housing costs have been particularly pronounced in Bellevue, where the median monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment is $2,170, which represents a year-over-year growth of 10.7%. In 2017, Bellevue City Council approved a multi-pronged Affordable Housing Strategy meant to create and preserve 2,500 units of affordable housing over the next 10 years, a target that the city is slated to approach by the end of 2023 when accounting for projects in the development pipeline. At a July 5 meeting, the city council discussed a suite of potential options for next steps to deliver affordable housing. Dubbed “Next Right Work,” the body directed staff to evaluate options for encouraging micro-housing, reducing permit fees, and allowing a higher Floor-Area Ratio (FAR) for residential development, with additional scoping work to come for simplifications to the permitting process and missing middle housing developments (i.e., accessory dwelling units, duplexes, and triplexes).

Under discussion at that meeting were two proposals that ultimately did not get a recommendation from the city council for further action. Commercial linkage fees, a policy requiring developers of commercial or retail properties to contribute funds for affordable housing, was recommended by staff as a high impact action that could generate significant funds, but a majority of the councilmembers did not support the policy’s advancement for further review. Staff also recommended that a policy of mandatory inclusionary zoning not be advanced for further review, but with the results of this poll showing that nearly 80% of residents support the policy, further study would be commensurate with its broad public support.

The Bellevue Housing Research Coalition is a partnership between Housing Development Consortium, Eastside For All, Sightline Institute, Northwest Progressive Institute, and Complete Streets Bellevue. (Full disclosure: the author of this article is the founder of Complete Streets Bellevue.) The poll was conducted between August 15th and 19th and has a modeled margin of error of 5.2%. More information, as well as the exact poll questions and detailed data, is available from The Cascadia Advocate.

The post Majority of Bellevue Residents Support Inclusionary Zoning, Worry About Affordable Housing in New Poll first appeared on The Urbanist.

“I’m not happy at all with how the MHA program is,” Harrell told the D1 Community Network, later adding: “I’m watching the growth happen on unsatisfactory levels.”

The Urbanist followed up with Harrell spokesperson Jaime Housen to see if he could add any details, but mostly to no avail. Housen did say maximizing affordable housing production would be the focus, but that can mean different things to different people. Some growth skeptics have used high inclusionary zoning requirements to squash new development (which then costs affordable homes tied to new development, too) rather than maximize affordable housing creation.

“We are looking to review and address issues in the program now that we have a few years of data,” Harrell’s spokesperson said. “We want to evaluate where there are issues and make improvements where needed to ensure we are building as much affordable housing as possible.”

So far, MHA appears to be on pace to produce the 6,000 affordable rent-restricted homes over a decade the City had promised when it passed the program over a series of votes in 2017 and 2019. The program traded modest upzones for new requirements that new residential and commercial projects provide affordable housing on-site or pay an in-lieu fee calibrated to fund a similar amount of housing via the City’s nonprofit partners.

As of the end of 2021, the MHA program has pulled in $171.4 million in developer fees, which has helped boost the City’s affordable housing awards to new heights. The Seattle Office of Housing said the 2021 MHA revenue will fund more than 900 affordable homes, in addition to the 95 MHA units created on-site. While in-lieu MHA payments have been strong, developers have not opted to produce as many affordable homes on-site as the City projected, which has some councilmembers suggesting reforms are in order to get more on-site production. Loudest among them is Alex Pedersen, who has a long history of criticizing the MHA program.

“The first iteration of MHA has been a disappointment with the vast majority of developers choosing to write a check to avoid building any affordable housing on site in the neighborhoods that need them,” Pedersen wrote in an August 2021 newsletter. “Based on the 2020 figures from the City, the MHA program appears to be a grand bargain mainly for developers who get the ability to build more while skirting the full cost of providing the affordable housing originally promised.”

Pedersen argued increasing fees would increase production of low-income housing: “Rather than an indirect tinkering with land use code definitions and acquiescing to for-profit developer requests for additional blanket upzone giveaways, let’s do what’s actually needed: increase the fees so that growth pays for growth and we produce more low-income housing faster.”

The City, however, has argued that because MHA payments can be leveraged with other funding sources, they actually produce more affordable housing than on-site production. MHA critics like Pedersen dispute this claim and see the in-lieu fee as a copout.

“One of the easiest ways to improve the MHA program is by increasing the fees so that developers are incentivized to produce more low-income housing on site, serving households earning no more than 60% of the area median income,” he wrote.

Pedersen said the blame would fall on his colleagues if they didn’t pursue reforms.

“The failure of MHA to result in inclusionary low-income housing is not the fault of developers whose profit motive will maximize whatever opportunities are allowed,” he wrote. “The shortcoming is on City government policymakers, especially if improvements to the MHA program are avoided by City Hall.”

In a February 2022 newsletter, Pedersen fretted about “profit-drive construction” bringing “all the disruptive downside with none of the affordable housing upside.”

While Pedersen seems keen on using MHA fees to curb new housing production by what he views as profit hungry developers, his colleagues may be hesitant to go that far. Still, there may be an appetite to recalibrate to seek a 50/50 split between on-site production and in-lieu payments. The Mayor has so far to declined to weigh in on that particular debate, however.

At his West Seattle appearance, Harrell also teased a proposal that he may reconstitute the District Neighborhood Councils that Mayor Ed Murray cut official ties with in 2016 after they fought to obstruct his Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda (which resulted in the MHA program) and a City report found the district councils were slanted toward White, wealthy homeowners and not representative of the larger population. Harrell pledged that his administration would announce a District Neighborhood Council proposal by the end of summer, Ryan Packer of The Urbanist noted.

Another proposal Harrell has teased is design review and permitting reform, where he spoke of streamlining permitting while still keeping design review “safeguards.” In a March interview with Puget Sound Business Journal, Harrell also voiced interest in microhousing and regulatory changes to promote production of it. So far such a proposal is still in development and Harrell has declined to offer much in the way of specifics: “We continue to explore a return of microhousing and are still studying options at this time,” Harrell’s spokesperson said.

Overall, some Harrell housing initiatives are slowly forming, but the policy details remain fairly murky. Mayor Harrell has claimed that the City lacked a plan for homelessness and affordable housing when he came to office and insisted that he had righted the ship and implemented one, led by his recent rollout of a homelessness data dashboard. However, that dashboard effort could be seen as repackaging existing programs and information, as discussed in a recent episode of The Urbanist podcast.

The Urbanist asked Harrell’s spokesperson how Seattle’s homelessness and housing strategy is tangibly different than it was last year, when Mayor Jenny Durkan — formerly a close ally of Harrell’s who he also glowingly endorsed during her 2017 mayoral run — was still in office.

“Under Mayor Harrell, the City has been addressing the homelessness crisis with a new level of urgency and collaboration,” Harrell’s spokesperson said.

Through his spokesperson, Harrell provided the following examples of how the City has been working to expand housing options and get homeless people indoors, which implicitly weren’t happening over the last couple of years:

• “Forming the Unified Care Team to bring all City departments working on this issue into the same room to drive a more streamlined, efficient, and collaborative City effort to address homelessness;”
• “Bringing that same approach to the creation of a Housing Sub-Cabinet dedicated to developing more housing of all kinds more quickly;”
• “Supporting regional solutions and for the first time convening the RHA with other partners to address encampments like Woodland Park, leading to the most referrals to shelter during an encampment closure in City history;”
• “Improving and consolidating data collection to better understand and respond to the scope of the homelessness crisis;”
• “Showcasing clear, transparent, measurable and accountable goals for adding units of shelter and housing;”
• “Setting a clear commitment to approve all affordable housing permits within 12 months of submission;”
• “Supporting acquisition efforts to swiftly open additional permanent housing options like Dockside.”

The list is heavy with bringing people together or working to improve processes or set clearer metrics. Absent from the list is new funding to build more affordable housing or land use changes to allow affordable housing in more places. It’s not clear how the MHA changes Harrell has in mind on that front will help or hurt the City’s attempts to address homelessness.

Overall, when it comes to increasing affordable housing and curbing homelessness, Seattleites will likely ultimately judge Mayor Harrell by how well he arrives at the destination rather than how well he quantifies the journey and brands the process.

The post Harrell Teases Inclusionary Zoning Tweaks, but Nothing Concrete Yet first appeared on The Urbanist.

“I’m especially excited about this year’s Affordable Housing Week proclamation because we have a lot of work to do in the horizon, but we’ve also been able to celebrate a tremendous amount of wins in the last few years,” Mosqueda said during the weekly council briefing on Monday, noting Jumpstart revenues would continue to increase in coming years.

The first year of Jumpstart spending plan was used to backfill holes in Mayor Jenny Durkan’s budget, but the long-term spending plan sets aside two-thirds of revenue for affordable housing. As of April when projections were again revised up, Jumpstart is projected to pull in about $277 million this year, and the tax prevailed in its first legal challenge from the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce.

Paired with increasing proceeds from Seattle’s Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) program and the Seattle Housing Levy, Jumpstart is poised to continue to boost the City’s affordable housing awards over coming years. This has already fueled a significant uptick in affordable housing production from the City’s nonprofit partners.

“There are over 5,400 new affordable units currently under development, with 4,000 of those opening in this upcoming year,” Mosqueda said. “That’s an incredible investment.”

MHA posts record-setting $76 million haul in 2021

The Seattle Office of Housing revealed that last year MHA raised almost $76 million in fees and produced 95 rent-capped units on-site in its annual housing reports released earlier this month. “Both metrics increased from 2020, when Covid-19 disrupted the market and when the totals were $68 million in fees and 21 on-site units,” noted Daniel Beekman of The Seattle Times, who covered the news earlier this week. From its inception through the end of 2021, MHA has pulled in $171.4 million. Even with the recent surge in production, only about 9% of Seattle’s housing stock is composed of affordable rent-restricted homes.

The Seattle Office of Housing said the 2021 MHA haul will fund more than 900 affordable homes (past projects are laid out in its investment report). The department assumes $80,000 of City support per unit on average, Beekman noted. A typical affordable home may cost about four times that much to build, but affordable housing builders typically braid that City award with state grants, federal support (often led by Low Income Housing Tax Credits), philanthropic support, and loans, which are sometimes offered at below-market rates via local corporate largesse or government programs.

The increase in affordable housing funding is well-timed because building costs are skyrocketing, and the need is also increasing as many working class residents find themselves priced out of the regional housing market. Single family home prices saw unprecedented one-year jumps last year, often in the 20% to 33% range, particularly on the Eastside, although formerly moderately priced cities like Lynnwood, Kent, and Renton also saw huge jumps. The extra funding will help keep up with climbing building costs, but there is also a great need to ramp up production.

“Over the last five years, building costs are up about 24%,” HDC executive director Patience Malaba said at the Affordable Housing Week kickoff event on Monday. She added that interest rates and land costs were up, too.

While calling for more resources for existing providers, the Housing Development Consortium has opposed a recent effort to explore a social housing model with publicly owned land, mixed-income buildings, and greater tenant control of buildings. Last month, HDC came out against Initiative 135, which creates a public development authority to build social housing. The Urbanist dug into that proposal from House Our Neighbors in March.

“We welcome innovation and share many of the same values as the backers of the Initiative. These include the belief that every person deserves a safe, affordable home, and that we need a scale of public investment in affordable housing that lives up to this value,” HDC said in its statement. “However, this Initiative would divert scarce public resources toward the creation of a new bureaucracy and is a distraction from what should be our priority as a City — greatly increasing funding for affordable housing to meet the scale of the need.”

That ballot measure will go to voters in November if the House Our Neighbors campaign is able to collect enough signatures.

Need for zoning reform

While social housing was earning some pushback, panelists at the HDC kickoff event agreed zoning changes were needed to allow more multifamily housing across Seattle. Panelists Mosqueda, Malaba, King County Councilmember Girmay Zahilay, and Gregg Coburn, who is author of Homelessness is a Housing Problem, all agreed on that point.

“We need to address this extremely restrictive zoning policies that we have at the local level,” Zahilay said. “Seventy-five percent of the residential land in Seattle, for example, is zoned for detached single family homes. I recently took a trip to Germany… and there are so many places that are shocked that we have zoning the way we do. You can nice-looking, quaint, quiet neighborhood that have duplexes and triplexes. That’s not a hard thing to do. And yet we still have these burdens on the ability to build dense, walkable neighborhoods. We have a big role in addressing these issues.”

“It starts with zoning,” Mosqueda agreed. “We must rezone our city and make sure we have a truly inclusive Seattle.”

The panel also stressed the racial equity implications of housing policies past and present and the negative impact of the workers not being able to afford to live in the cities where they work or have built communities.

“Right now we are third highest mega-commuter city in the entire country, meaning people are spending an hour or two hours in their cars just to get to work,” Mosqueda said. “This is not good for the health of our communities; it’s not good for the health of our planet, and it’s not good for the health of our economy, either.”

To address the housing crisis with a racial equity focus, Mosqueda called more affordable housing, both rental and homeownership options at all income levels, and “to truly densifying how folks can live across our city.” Seattle also added a community preference policy and an affirmative marketing program to help increase disadvantaged group’s access to the affordable homes the City is funding, such as Black residents who have been displaced out of the Central District.

That zoning fight is set to take place when Seattle’s Comprehensive Plan is updated in 2024, and Mosqueda encouraged people to participate in that process as planning and outreach picks up in 2023. In the meantime, she encouraged advocates to push for housing funding. Coburn called for a large-scale “Marshall Plan” for housing and warned against nibbling around the edges since housing is such a massive problem interconnected with other crises. His book argues the solving homelessness crisis first and foremost stems from the housing shortage despite efforts to brand homeless people as addicts, criminals, and/or lazy pariahs undeserving of help and in need of stern hand and punitive measures.

Malaba concluded the panel with a reminder that the Seattle Housing Levy is up for renewal in 2023, and hinted at a push to increase its size. The 2016 levy is raising $290 million over seven years. Seattle has voted yes on every housing levy since the first was put to voters in 1981.

The post Seattle Posts Record Housing Revenue, but Affordable Housing Needs Outpace Supply first appeared on The Urbanist.

Like other neighborhoods in Seattle zoned for apartments, the Chinatown-International District (CID) faces heavy development pressure. These pressures are particularly acute in the CID, as it has rare high-rise zoning, rapidly developing neighbors to the north in Downtown and to the east in the Central District, core transportation connections, and major infill opportunities. Even before Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) upzones, the CID had high-rise zoning that allowed some developers to sneak in major developments before the inclusionary housing/linkage fee was implemented. Outside of a brief pandemic trough, this development has not slowed. This article will cover the flurry of development and permitting activity within the CID over the past three years.

While not the core focus of this article, it is impossible to discuss CID development without acknowledging the massive displacement risk and gentrification felt by residents. According to the Seattle 2035 Growth and Equity report, the CID ranks among the highest in displacement risk in a survey of Seattle neighborhoods. This risk generates strong community and institutional interest in anti-displacement efforts and affordable housing development in the CID, present in community organization and the significant presence of affordable development.

For the sake of simplicity and organization, I’ll be crudely using the Chinatown-International District Business Improvement Area’s map to draw districts within the CID, a disservice to the complex intermingling of the respective and other Asian businesses and residents. The CID can be roughly broken into Japantown, Chinatown, and Little Saigon. Japantown resides west of I-5 and north of S Jackson Street. Chinatown is also west of I-5 but south of S Jackson Street. Little Saigon is for the most part within the CID’s borders east of I-5. Notable developments adjacent to the CID are also included in this count.

Japantown

Closest to the Downtown core, Japantown’s development will mirror its northern neighbors with the tallest high-rises allowed in the CID. The site of community protests with the construction of the KODA condominiums, Japantown has the tallest building in the neighborhood at 17 stories tall. However, KODA may be surpassed in the next few years as Fujimatsu Village is being planned to be 28 stories tall.

• 101 6th Avenue S – Hana Apartments
  • An 8-story, 160-unit affordable housing apartment building with ground-floor childcare.
  • Certificate of Occupancy issued on January 25, 2020. The building is a Multi-Family Tax Exemption (MFTE) participant.
• 206 5th Avenue S – Origins 206
  • An 8-story, 66-unit mixed-use building with 1,849 square feet of commercial space.
  • The project is in permitting. MHA is required, $1,075,864.80 is the contribution requirement.
• 214-220 5th Avenue S – Blossom Apartments
  • A 9-story, 184-unit mixed-use building with 4,625 square feet of commercial space. Around 20 parking spaces are proposed.
  • The project is in permitting. MHA is required.
• 450 S Main Street – KODA Condominiums
  • A 17-story, 203-unit condominium with ground-floor commercial space. 75 parking spaces were built.
  • MHA was required, $4,373,005 was the contribution requirement. Certificate of Occupancy issued on January 3, 2020.
• 500 S Jackson Street – Fujimatsu Village
  • A 28-story, 343-unit mixed-use building with 24,000 square feet of retail. 211 below-grade parking spaces are proposed.
  • MHA is required.

Chinatown

Not entirely sheltered from high-rises, Chinatown will likely also see its fair share of double-digit story buildings. Perhaps the most notable projects are at Chinatown’s southern flank where a 1.5 million square foot office campus and 20 story tower is being proposed. Additional projects of interest include the affordable Uncle Bob’s Place (named after CID activist Bob Santos) and Jasmine, a 17-story project seeking to replace an old commercial building that’s a focus of CID Coalition/humbows not hotels’ community organizing.

• 701 S Jackson Street
  • A 9-story, 238-unit mixed use building with ground-floor retail. No parking is proposed.
  • MHA is required.
• 669 S King Street – Louisa Hotel Renovation
  • An existing 5-story, mixed use building with ground-floor retail converted to now have 48 apartments and 36 small efficiency dwelling units (SEDU) in addition to retail.
  • Certificate of Occupancy issued on June 18, 2019. All units are rent/income restricted, some on MFTE.
• 714 S King Street – Uncle Bob’s Place
  • An 8-story, 126-unit affordable housing apartment building with 6,087 square feet of commercial space. No parking proposed.
  • The project is under construction.
• 614-20 Maynard Avenue S – Jasmine
  • A 17-story, around 200-unit mixed-use building with around 10,000 square feet of commercial space. 3 levels of parking with around 103 parking stalls are proposed.
  • The project is in permitting. MHA is required.
• 616 8th Avenue S
  • A 13-story, 202-unit mixed-use building with ground-floor retail spaces. 2 levels of below grade parking with 116 parking stalls are proposed.
  • The project is in permitting. MHA will likely apply.
• 821 7th Avenue S
  • A 20-story, 380-unit mixed-use building with ground floor retail space. 3 levels of below grade parking with 180 parking stalls are proposed.
  • The project is in early permitting, MHA is required.
• 1000-1052 6th Avenue S
  • An office building campus with 4 to 6 buildings, depending on how you count them, varying between 8-10 stories tall. Together, they will have over a million and a half square feet of office/lab/retail space and 682 parking stalls. All buildings will have ground-floor retail.
  • The project is in permitting. MHA is required, ~$12.3 million is roughly the contribution requirement.

Little Saigon

Little Saigon is zoned for high-rises but hasn’t seen any proposed yet. However, this district is the heaviest hitter among the three arbitrary districts that I’m using for the article. Midrise projects are flooding into the area. Much of the CID’s affordable housing is also being located here.

• 209 12th Avenue S – Mason & Main
  • A 9-story, 550-unit mixed-use building with 7,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space. Below grade parking with 198 parking stalls is under construction. MFTE and market-rate units, 417 market-rate and 133 rent-restricted 80% AMI units, are to be provided.
  • The project is under construction. One of two Yesler Terrace developments directly adjacent to or in the CID.
• 321 10th Avenue S – Juniper
  • A 7-story, 94-unit affordable housing apartment building. 47 parking stalls are proposed.
  • The project is in permitting. The second of two Yesler Terrace developments directly adjacent to or in the CID.
• 1221 S Main Street
  • A 130,000 square-foot, 160-unit mixed-use building. 75 parking spaces are proposed.
  • The project is in early permitting. MHA is required.
• 913 S Jackson Street – Thai Binh Apartments
  • A 7-story, 249-unit mixed-use building with 7606 square feet of retail space. 80 parking stalls and 87 bike parking spaces are provided. Based on a Northwest Asian Weekly article, this is a fully affordable 60% AMI building funded by Wells Fargo for low-income housing tax credits. The building is a participant in MFTE and other
  • Certificate of Occupancy was issued on 4/24/2019.
• 1029 S Jackson Street – BEAM apartments
  • An 8-story, 321-unit mixed-use building with ground-floor retail space. 177 parking stalls have been provided. 65 affordable units are provided, through MFTE participation.
  • Certificate of Occupancy was issued on 6/10/2021.
• 1032 S Jackson Street
  • A 450-unit mixed-use building with 8,000 square feet of retail space. 290 parking stalls are proposed.
  • In early permitting. MHA is required.
• 1237 S Jackson Street
  • A 6-story, 84-unit mixed-use building with 3,480 square feet of retail space is preferred. 34 parking stalls are proposed.
  • In early permitting. MHA is required.
• 1253 S Jackson Street – An Lac
  • A 6-story, 69-unit affordable housing mixed-use building with 9,800 square feet of commercial space.
  • Certificate of Occupancy issued on February 20, 2020.

• 1005 S King Street – Hà Tiên
  • A 10-story, 105-unit mixed-use building with 3,561 square feet of commercial space. 76 parking stalls and 100 bike parking stalls are proposed.
  • The project is in early permitting. MHA is required, MHA performance is indicated with 8 affordable units.
• 1040 S King Street – King Apartments
  • An 8-story, 57-unit mixed-use building with ground-floor commercial space. 9 parking stalls are proposed.
  • The project is in permitting. MHA is not required, it began pre-MHA.
• 1261 S King Street
  • A 7-story, mixed-used building with 20 apartments, 4 live/work units, and commercial space. 1 unit will be affordable.
  • The permit has been issued.
• 501 Rainier Avenue S – Bob and Marcia Almquist Place
  • A 7-story, 105-unit affordable housing mixed-use building with ground-floor retail space. 11 parking stalls have been provided. As a Plymouth Housing building, these units are permanent supportive housing.
  • Certificate of Occupancy issued on April 29, 2020.
• 606 12th Avenue S – Native Village/SISC Pearl Warren Redevelopment
  • A 5-story, 119-unit affordable housing residential building. 44 parking spaces are proposed.
  • The project is in early permitting. Early documents indicate that this is the first of two phases.
• 622 Rainier Avenue S
  • A 3 building, 7-story mixed-use complex with 205 units and retail. 112 parking stalls are provided.
  • The project is under construction. MHA is required, a $3.5+ million contribution is expected.
• 718 Rainier Avenue S – Muir Apartments
  • A 9-story, mixed-use building with 129 apartments, 6 live/work units, and ground-floor retail. Two of the nine stories contain provided basement parking.
  • Certificate of Occupancy issued on June 18, 2019. 27 units are affordable through MFTE participation.

Altogether, over 4,500 units have either been constructed since 2019 or been in the permitting process. 1,326 units have been completed. 1,240 units of some sort of affordability have been completed or been in the permitting process. 749 units of some sort of affordability have been completed since 2019. Notably, nearly all these projects include commercial space. If all the projects located in this article are constructed, expect more affordable units to be provided and tens of millions of dollars paid into the City’s affordable housing fund via MHA.

Blue pins indicate developments that are or are expected to be market-rate or mostly market-rate, while green indicates affordable/income-restricted homes, and starred pins are completed.

In regard to displacement, it’s unclear how the effect of the current construction of affordable units will fend off displacement risk. What is painfully evident, however, is the regional shortage of housing that is inflating housing costs to new records and pushing displacement risk farther up the income scale. The CID is also empirically disproportionately burdened with the development of new housing due to its intense zoning compared to the rest of the city. This painful confluence creates a bit of an urbanist contradiction in the CID, one that seeks the development of much needed new housing while also avoiding the displacement of longtime neighborhood residents.

One fix may be to work toward a more even distribution of zoning for increased housing capacity throughout Seattle and the surrounding region to prevent development pressures from intensifying in only a few liberally zoned areas, like the CID. At this point, however, anti-displacement work in the CID will be more restorative than preventative given the recent history of displacement in the neighborhood.

Lower impact opportunities to develop new housing also may exist with the abundance and even distribution of surface parking in the CID, but that won’t stop gentrification that’s a product of dilution, new waves of Asian migration, and class ascendency. Chinatown has changed a lot since my family began immigrating to the region in the 80s and 90s.

In my own short memory, I can trace a line of change that has opened up boba shops and other signs of flux within the Asian American community. From what I remember as a food scene of Cantonese eateries and banh mi sandwiches has been diversified to include a gamut of other Chinese and Asian cuisines. We’ve got Viet Cajun, Korean corn dogs, poké, Sichuan, and hot pot now. While it’s not only serving up old school Humbow, which is what I’m learning some folks call Asian sweet or savory stuffed buns, the International District remains distinctly, if not more, international.

The post International District Development Wave Comes with Growing Pains and Opportunities first appeared on The Urbanist.

Millions for affordable housing in Seattle

In her final housing announcement, Mayor Jenny Durkan shared that the city had received $95 million in local investments supporting “the construction, rehabilitation, and acquisition of over 1,100 affordable homes.” The new funds raise the 2021 total to $143 million, City’s single year largest investment in affordable housing, representing a 20% increase over the previous record in 2020.

Of those 1,100 new homes, the funding is slated to cover the construction of 692 new affordable rental homes, the rehabilitation of 364 existing affordable rental homes, and the acquisition of a newly constructed 63 unit apartment building, Goldfinch Apartments, which in partnership with the Chief Seattle Club, will provide homes to individuals experiencing homelessness and provide culturally appropriate services for people identifying as American Indian and Alaskan Native.

Mayor Durkan also highlighted her administration’s achievements in creating affordable housing. “Over 35 years, we created 13,000 affordable homes through the Housing Levy, yet in last four years, we put an unprecedented level of investments in housing to create and preserve 7,600 affordable homes,” said Mayor Durkan.

Where did the $95 million come from? According to an official statement provided to The Urbanist by the Office of Housing, “The housing investments announced on December 9 reflect a number of sources including, but not limited to, proceeds from the voter-approved Seattle Housing Levy, payments received through the Incentive Zoning and Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) programs, and various federal funds.”

Office of Housing was unable to specify exactly which federal housing funds were included because some of the individual projects are applying for federal grants, which, if they succeed, will alter the mix of federal funds.

It’s important to point out the important role funding raised by MHA is playing in creating affordable housing. Last spring, The Urbanist reported on how the MHA program has been performing well since it was (finally) passed into law in 2019. In 2020, MHA fees contributed $52.3 million of Seattle OH’s record award of $115.9 million in annual housing investments. OH didn’t provide an exact figure for 2021, but it’s likely higher than 2020.

The Seattle City Council has also unanimously approved Council Bill (CB) 120238 which amended the City’s 2021 Annual Action for Housing and Community Development allowing for the City to undertake activities that will allow it receive $12.2 million in funding for acquisition and construction of affordable housing through the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The funding comes from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA).

Seattle’s approved 2022 budget further increases funding in affordable housing to the tune of $194 million, relying on JumpStart funding and more ARPA dollars. Next year’s MHA proceeds will further add to that total.

King County Council Passes Health Through Housing Implementation Plan

The King County Council passed its initial implementation plan for its Health Through Housing program (HTH), which aims to create up to 1,600 emergency housing and permanent supportive housing units for people experiencing chronic homelessness. The program has already created housing in Seattle, Renton, Federal Way, Redmond and Auburn.

Health Through Housing is funded by a 0.1% increase of the County’s sales tax. Half of the funds raised are used to acquire housing by purchasing existing facilities like hotels and nursing homes, while the other half of funds are spent on services. In 2021, the County increased spending to $297 million by bonding some of the future proceeds; $67 million is expected to spent in 2022.

Before the vote, several councilmembers spoke enthusiastically about Health Through Housing. “For me it’s a real game-changer,” said Jeanne Kohl-Welles (District 4 – Seattle).

Council Vice Chair Joe McDermott (District 8 – Southwest Seattle, Burien, and Vashon Island), citing that the County is in “desperate need of permanent housing in South King County,” applauded cities like Renton for stepping up to help and called on others to join the county’s efforts.

The more cities that partner with us… I think we’ll have an exponential snowball effect because one of the things I heard early on is this false fear that if we build it they will come — and the fear some cities have expressed is “well if we are the only one providing services then we’ll have lots of individual with high social service needs coming to our cities and nowhere else.”

Well, as more and more cities each implement this program, it truly does become regional. I do think it’s critical and a reminder to work with the community and work with the local jurisdictions with as much lead time as possible, to listen sincerely and not be afraid to adjust operational decisions, and make sure that as we implement this program in different communities we are doing it in a way that really meets the needs of that community, and integrates with the community.

King County Council Vice Chair Joe McDermott.

Master Builders allege that MHA fees decrease townhome production

Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish Counties (MBAKS) sent a letter to Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan last week stating that since the implementation of citywide the Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) program in April of 2019, many townhome projects have become “infeasible.” Under MHA, new development must either provide affordable housing on-site or pay into an affordable housing pool, in exchange, developers are allowed to have a density bonus (e.g., build taller structures and more floor area). However, MBAKS complained that in the case of townhomes, which are generally built in low-rise zones, developers are required to pay fees without receiving an effective bonus (since a fourth floor in a townhome can be awkward, especially with upper-level setback requirements biting into it).

Pointing to a report generated using city data indicating that townhome production is declining, MBAKS claimed that the MHA fees are resulting in preventing “Seattle’s housing supply from growing at the pace needed to better meet the strong demand for more affordable housing choices.”

In its letter, MBAKS cites, “the MHA fee costs nearly $32,743 per [t]ownhome or $130,972 for an average four-unit project across all zones.” The fact that the fee must be paid before permits are issued and cannot be paid installments was another source of contention.

While there was a provision intended to provide relief for developers of smaller buildings like townhomes from undue fees, MBAKS argues that it “provides insufficient relief from these burdens.” Currently in order to receive a waiver from or reduction in MHA fees, a developer must demonstrate a “severe economic impact at such a level that a property owner’s constitutional rights may be at risk.” However, the provision also stipulates that economic impact cannot be solely based on the fact that the developer is unable to build additional units as a result of the density bonus.

In terms of solutions, MBAKS is asking the City to pass legislation that exempts townhome projects from MHA fees “so long as they increase the housing supply on their development sites.” Short of that, the organization also expressed it would be satisfied with developers only paying MHA fees for floor area that exceeds the size limits that were in place prior to MHA, and if townhome builders, and buyers, would be able to make MHA payments over time, similar to how King County sewage treatment capacity charges are paid over time.  

Potentially passing on MHA fees to future homebuyers would result in a higher housing cost, although spreading out the payments over a period of time might help, the association argues. According to MBAKS report, the average townhouse in Seattle sold for $699,950 between August and October 2021, not exactly an affordable price, but far less than the cost of an existing or new single-family home. MBAKS cited that during the three months leading up to the report, townhomes had made up 68% of family-sized home sales and 79% of all Built Green project certifications (a sustainability designation) in Seattle.

MBAKS has reason to hope to have greater influence with the incoming administration. MBAKS Director of Governmental Affairs Marco Lowe is leaving his post to accept a position as Chief Operations Officer for Mayor-Elect Bruce Harrell. Lowe previously worked in the mayoral administrations of both Greg Nickels and Mike McGinn. Though filling an operations rather than policy role this time around, the post could indicate MBAKS has Harrell’s ear.

On the other hand, Harrell was clear on the campaign trail that he was not interested in citywide zoning changes, preferring a more incremental approach, which had been laid out by ally and new “Director of Strategic Initiatives” Tim Burgess. Status quo zoning leaves Seattle with roughly 30 square miles dedicated to single-family homes compared to just 10 square miles where multifamily projects and townhomes are allowed. This imbalance in land use could also be part of the slowdown in townhome production from earlier peaks when lowrise zones were less built out.

New Tacoma housing for people exiting homelessness

The Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI) celebrated the opening of Aspen Court, a 94-room hotel, which will offer enhanced shelter to people experiencing homelessness in Pierce County. The property was purchased with $8.8 million in capital investment contributions from Pierce County, City of Tacoma and City of Lakewood.

After operating as an enhanced shelter for two years, Aspen Court will be renovated to add kitchenettes to the rooms to create permanent supportive housing. LIHI has applied to the Washington State Department of Commerce to fund the renovations.

Aspen Court will be able to house up to 120 people and will allow for pets. Work has already been undertaken to identify people sleeping outside to refer, including seniors, pregnant women, and people who are frail and in poor health. On-site case managers will be present to help residents with housing and employment applications, healthcare, transportation, counseling, and help
with re-connecting with family or friends.

Aspen Court is the first enhanced shelter to be opened by LIHI in the Tacoma area. The agency already operates three tiny houses villages in Tacoma that provide shelter to people existing homelessness.

In Pierce County, 10,858 individuals experienced homelessness over the course of the year in 2020, LIHI spokesperson Aaron Long said. The 2020 point-in-time count recorded 1,897 homeless people, with 544 from Tacoma. 

Meanwhile up north, the January 2020 point-in-time count found 11,751 people were experiencing homelessness in King County. King County declined to conduct a point-in-time count in 2021 or in 2022, citing pandemic interruptions. This could lead to issues securing federal funding as every-other-year counts are required by the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The post Housing Notes: Seattle’s $143 Million Haul, Townhome Slowdown, More Housing For People Exiting Homelessness first appeared on The Urbanist.