GILROY
– Affordable housing coffers in Santa Clara County are $3.5
million fatter heading into the holiday season.
GILROY – Affordable housing coffers in Santa Clara County are $3.5 million fatter heading into the holiday season.
Last week, county Supervisors authorized $3 million to be used as seed money for new affordable housing projects in Silicon Valley. Supervisors also contributed an additional $500,000 to the Housing Trust of Santa Clara which helps first-time home buyers.
“The county has set aside $18.6 million for affordable housing,” said Margie Matthews, director of the Office of Affordable Housing for Santa Clara County. “So far we’ve realized $12.8 million of that. We hope to (allocate) the rest when the economy turns around.”
The recent allocations follow nearly $8 million in a first round of county funding that went toward affordable housing projects since July 2002. In March, the county will begin taking applications from developers for the current round of funds.
As for the $500,000 given to the Housing Trust of Santa Clara, the money will be used immediately.
Over the last two years, the Housing Trust doled out 852 loans to working families, spokesman Maury Kendall said. Of those, 32 loans went to Gilroyans.
“The new money means dozens of Gilroyans may get first-time home buyer loans,” Kendall said.
Loans are zero interest and often are given to teachers, nurses, police officers and firefighters to help pay closing costs or down payments.
“These are as close to receiving a grant as you can possibly come,” Kendall said. “In two years, we’ve yet to seek repayment from anyone we’ve made a loan to.”
Kendall said if a home buyer sells their home, the loan would be repaid at that time with the money going back into the program’s pot.
Since the loan ultimately lowers one’s mortgage rate and since home values typically rise over time, the home buyer still benefits substantially.
County housing monies have gone toward more than just first-time home buyer programs. Within the first round of funding, $1.7 million went to South County Housing for the 60-family housing complex at 9345 Monterey Road that will be used for families transitioning to permanent housing.
Another $1.5 million grant went to Emergency Housing Consortium for a multipurpose facility that will provide 75 emergency shelter beds and 65 transitional beds for single adults.
