Millennials Squeeze Affordable Housing
Boston has more affordable and mid-market housing than most, but it must do better, says housing chief Sheila Dillon. On July 21, the Walsh Administration's housing task force that she leads will offer ideas on how to solve a problem troubling most US metros. (So post the answer on Tumblr, then everyone can use it.)
The Millennials and seniors producing Boston’s first population growth in decades are also exerting pressure on the housing stock, Sheila says. They’re snapping up apartments, condos, and houses in neighborhoods once filled with private mid-market housing and driving up prices. Already, 25,000 households pay more than 50% of their income on housing, she says.
Boston, doing better than most cities, has added 50,000 high-quality mid-market housing units with public funding to its total housing stock of 250,000 units. The Walsh Administration will keep pushing to produce more with public dollars but recognizes that the city has to make it easier for private developers to ramp up production, Sheila tells us. Her task force is identifying areas that can accommodate more moderately priced housing. Some will be on the Red, Orange, and Fairmont subway lines and other mass transit nodes.
The City will also focus on neighborhoods comfortable with dense multifamily development, Shelia says. Some will be light industrial areas with low-rise buildings and good transit access: perhaps Sullivan Square or Fort Hill. Others will be more accustomed to dense development like Chinatown, where the Mayor, the Chinese Economic Development Council's Dr. Edward Chiang, and these masked men broke ground (above) on Oxford Ping On’s 67 affordable rental apartments last month.
The City spends $30M/year—which it leverages by a factor of 10—to produce and preserve affordable housing. But, Sheila says, it’s committed to increase funding for affordable housing and also will consider adjusting zoning, density, and height rules, she says. (Does this mean Rajon Rondo can add a few inches, too?)
