There are many factors that are influencing the housing market’s current challenges. After years of record-low interest rates, real-estate market activity has declined following interest rates’ recent upward trends. Further, many properties are scooped up by speculators – most being assumed by non-local ownership, often international – which further strains the inventory open to the average prospective homeowner.
Localhousingsolutions.org cites four core reasons for the lack of affordable housing:
- Many workers’ wages haven’t kept pace with surging housing costs.
- For-profit developers don’t respond to the demand for affordable housing for lower-income families.
- Government regulations, such as limits on housing density, raise construction costs for all housing.
- A lack of government funding to subsidize affordable housing. According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, more than 32,000 households in the Greater Cincinnati area struggle to survive with 50% or less of area median income (AMI); according to Data USA, that threshold was $24,600 for a family of four in 2022.
The underlying causes and contributing factors to poverty and the subsequent lack of housing are complex and lack singular solutions. Providing both affordable and market-rate housing solutions will require myriad small, locally oriented developers to actively engage in their communities to align city leaders, stakeholders, and residents to invest in renovated properties in transitioning or economically challenged neighborhoods to provide improved commercial and residential inventory options.
From their OTR offices,
8K principals Michael Fischer, Barrett McClish, and Michael Chewning have steered their form to embody a thoroughly engaged approach that is helping revitalize neighborhoods by collaborating with city, neighborhood, and financial organizations with tools.
The firm assumed its name as an homage to the $8,000 Fischer and McClish invested to execute its first Northside property renovation in 2009. Since then, 8K has methodically approached the rejuvenation of longstanding properties, most of which have stood for more than a century. Chewning joined in 2017, and the firm has grown to 18 employees, adding three superintendents, four project managers, seven carpenters, and accounting, development, and property managers. Fischer acknowledged the entrenchment and difficulty of developing affordable housing solutions.
“It’s a local, statewide, and national problem,” Fischer said. “There are hundreds of thousands of Ohioans in need of affordable housing, but the low income housing tax credit only creates 2,000 units per year,” he said. “It’s a complicated challenge requiring a formulated approach and a number of partners.”
In neighborhoods across the city, 8K is playing a key role in creating viable opportunities for improving residential and commercial property opportunities in neighborhoods that have often been overlooked by development stakeholders.
Evanston
Bordering Hyde Park, East Walnut Hills, Avondale, and Norwood, Evanston (known originally as Idlewood before renamed in 1893 and annexed into Cincinnati 1903) has been a primarily African American community since the mid-20
th century. The 2020 census lists Evanston’s population as 8,838, less than half the reported 1960 population of 18,590. Such acute population loss invariably triggers declining economic opportunity, and it’s compounded by Evanston’s lack of a community development corporation (CDC), an essential tool in helping communities coalesce organizational and economic resources to attract businesses.
Given these challenging conditions, a plan and motivation are key ingredients to revitalizing communities. Crystal Grace embodies the devotion required to have faith in and bet on a community. An Evanston native, she recalls when the community had a thriving network of small businesses and envisions taking steps to regain a strong neighborhood economy.
“I recall when we had our own bakery, our own dry cleaner, hair salon, and restaurants,” she said. “There was a boarded-up coffee shop that had been closed for three years, and my friend, Taren Kinnebrew, and I decided to invest in opening a local business where our residents can buy coffee.”
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Scout Guide Cincinnati & RVP Photography Cream and Sugar proprietors (l to r) Crystal Grace and Taren Kinnebrew are excited about Evanston’s revitalization and appreciate 8K principals’ community engagement.
They opened
Cream and Sugar in June 2020, which was delayed several months from COVID-19’s onset. They withstood the challenging conditions, and Kinnebrew also established an Evanston bakery,
Sweet Petite Desserts, which supplies Cream and Sugar with an array of baked goods. Grace also owns a salon and spa called
Grit and Grace in Silverton.
“Entrepreneurship is going to be important to succeed in the 21
stcentury economy,” she said. “To really inspire the next generation, it’s important to reach them between six and 10 years old, when dreams grow. I want to show people in my community that people that look like us can be successful.”
Hopes for a more economically dynamic neighborhood reached an inflection point to help fuel such aspirations when 8K assumed ownership of buildings on the 3500 and 3600 blocks of Montgomery Road and 1700 block of Brewster Road, including Grace’s shop in late 2020. Even before 8K obtained ownership from the Walnut Hills Redevelopment Foundation and the Port of Cincinnati, Grace noted the firm’s commitment to the neighborhood.
“8K came to community council meetings and were very attentive in listening to residents and what they wanted to see in our community,” she said.
8K helped Cream and Sugar secure its future by signing a lease extension that provides long-term lease rights and locking in the same rent Grace and Kinnebrew paid prior to redevelopment.
The $8.4 million project encompasses development and upkeep of 6,735 sq. ft. of commercial space, 12 parking spaces, and 27 apartments intended to serve residents within the 60-80% AMI range that is slated for completion by the end of 2025. Fischer said low income housing tax credits are typically reserved for projects with more than 50 units. Securing them for this 27-unit project required years of persistence to make the financing come together. Funding sources include the city of Cincinnati’s investment of $1.85 million and the
Cincinnati Development Fund’s contribution of $5.3MM from its Affordable Housing Leverage Fund (AHLF) to help support the project in the form of forgivable loans, permanent debt and short-term bridge loans. Sources from the AHLF include City and County ARPA.
The
Cincinnati Preservation Association (CPA) supported the project from its preservation loan fund, which Chewning said was the first such loan the CPA has made. The state of Ohio contributed $905,000 through the state historic tax credit, which was facilitated through the Port’s creation of an Evanston historic district, and 8K’s equity funded the balance of project costs. Fischer expressed appreciation for the organization providing a four-year timeframe to assemble the required capital.
“Community collaboration made the project more affordable than we originally anticipated,” Fischer said.
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Community development corporation Price Hill Will engaged 8K to develop the Glenway Ave. property to create a win-win situation for the current tenants and develop appeal for would-be residents and business owners
West Price Hill
According to the most recent census, West Price Hill claims just under 20,000 residents, and slightly more than half of Price Hill’s total population. Price Hill peaked at 49,000 residents in 1960, and the last census indicated 8% growth and a reversal of decades-long decline.
An important agent in reversing Price Hill’s negative trajectory has been
Price Hill Will, its CDC that plays a vital role in supporting its business districts, increasing homeownership, and engaging the community to chart the community’s course. Samantha Conover, who’s worked for Price Hill Will for nine years as operations director and engagement coordinator, and is currently serving as its interim executive director, said the organization pursues an assets-based approach focusing on the community’s individual and collective skills and strengths rather than deficits.
She noted that Price Hill Will is currently engaged with 11 properties, including a mixed-use multi-building parcel along the 4000 block of Glenway Avenue in West Price Hill, across the street from Elder and Seton High Schools. The block comprises a standalone building with two apartments on the upper floors and two ground-level commercial spaces adjacent to a cluster of commercial buildings with six separate storefronts. Custom Cutts, an African American barbershop, and Tienda Tres Amigos, a Hispanic grocery owned by Guatemalan immigrants, are currently the only active businesses on the block.
“West Price Hill’s architecture has a lot of historical significance, and the community cares very much about saving them,” she said. “We reference outlined neighborhood plans and only taking projects with the community as a partner.”
The project had originally been pursued pre-COVID, but pandemic issues caused lingering delays. In 2022, the original developer had been unsuccessful in relocating the two businesses displaced by the original project’s proposed brewpub. The developer then attempted to evict Custom Cutts and Tienda Tres Amigos. When civic outcry ensued after the shop owners took the story to the press, the original developer abandoned the project and Price Hill Will engaged 8K to reimagine the property’s redevelopment. Conover praised the 8K team for “understanding neighborhood dynamics and respecting the neighborhood’s goals.”
Price Hill Will sold the buildings to 8K for $1, with both organizations and other stakeholders including
Northside Bank & Trust,
The Port of Cincinnati, and several private-equity investors, embraced a new direction for the $4.5 million project. 8K kicked off the project by promptly forging a path for the existing tenants to stay on the block while creating solid commercial opportunities for the entire neighborhood. Their rents will remain unchanged for the next 10 years, and 8K is currently marketing the remaining 6,000 sq. ft. of commercial space for development as a bar or restaurant. The property also includes several two-bedroom and two-family units that provide a solid opportunity for traditional business owners to live above their commercial space.
“A successful CDC builds trust with their neighborhood by engaging the community and investing in hyper-local solutions where the market has failed. They maximize community benefit before calculating profit,” Fischer said.
The reimagined project has created a win-win for the barbershop and tienda, which are supposed to move into their new digs just a few hundred feet away within weeks. Conover noted that the grocery, which had chronically dealt with insufficient storage in their space, will now have the benefit of a basement to help them manage inventory, and Custom Cutts will enjoy a larger space to help them turn heads. Fischer said the building to be remodeled was in fair condition but had been vacant for years and will be undergoing a stem-to-stern renovation with entirely new finishes and amenities.
Learn more about another 8K project in the Avondale community here.