Ada County’s median home price is $350k. These new homes getting built are $100k less
NeighborWorks Boise is back. In Garden City, that is.
The 38-year-old nonprofit, perhaps best known for its annual Paint the Town and Rake Up Boise volunteer events, works to get families into high-quality housing that they might not otherwise be able to afford. It just started work on a pocket neighborhood at 45th and Adams streets that will have 20 homes.
It’s the fifth of six pocket neighborhoods NeighborWorks has built, all but one in Garden City. The other project is in Boise.
The Flourish development will feature homes with 900 to 1,800 square feet each. Smaller homes have two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Larger ones have four bedrooms.
The smaller homes are larger than in previous projects, where the smallest ones were 678 square feet, said Bud Compher, NeighborWorks Boise’s CEO. Feedback from home-buying education classes NeighborWorks conducts found that families wanted slightly larger homes , he said.
“The smaller cottages have usually been the first ones off the shelf,” he said.
Prices will start in the low $200,000s. The median price for new homes sold in Garden City in September was $325,000, according to the Intermountain Multiple Listing Service.
Anyone can buy NeighborWorks houses. There are no eligibility requirements, Compher said. Buyers will likely have mixed income levels.
He said grants to help with down payments are available to families earning up to 80% of the area median income. For a family of four in Ada County, 80% is $58,900. For a couple, it’s $47,150.
“There will be an open common area where families can enter and large porches,” Compher said at a groundbreaking ceremony Tuesday. “There’s an opportunity because of the design for people to get to know their neighbors.”
Construction is expected to be completed by the end of 2020.
Mayor John Evans praised NeighborWorks for its commitment to Garden City. When Flourish residents move in, the five projects will have housed 75 residents in the city.
NeighborWorks gets most of its revenue from foundation, corporate and government grants. Don Melendez, Idaho regional president for Wells Fargo Bank, gave Compher a check for $225,000 to help home buyers make down payments. The bank has provided more than $4 million to NeighborWorks Boise for past home projects.
“We feel like we’re making a difference for people struggling to get into homes,” Melendez said.
The homes will be located two blocks to the Boise River.
“One thing about our pocket neighborhoods is that they’re close where people live, work and play,” Compher said. “The other option would be to drive until you can afford to live. That would put families farther out from where they work.”
This story was originally published November 12, 2019 at 5:30 PM.
