Williamstown Housing Trust Reviews Proposals for Land Purchase
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The trustees issued a request for proposals earlier this year for landowners looking to sell to the town. The trust's goal is to create one or more owner-occupied dwellings that would be perpetually affordable for residents at a given income level.
Five landowners submitted proposals, although one was not considered because it did not include an offering price as required under the terms of the recent request for proposals.
Four of the trust's five board members attended the Wednesday meeting, at which they scored the remaining four proposals and took input from Paul Austin of Northern Berkshire Habitat for Humanity, with whom the trustees are interested in partnering on a new build or renovation.
One of the four properties proposed was deemed too complicated and too expensive by the trustees. The owner of a 16-apartment and commercial space at the corner of Cole Avenue and Arnold Street offered the site for $3.2 million, which would be paid out in stages.
The trustees balked at the idea of depleting that much of their reserves and were hesitant to pursue a property the town would have to convert to condominiums in order to satisfy the trust's stated demand to create owner-occupied homes.
On the other hand, the trustees agreed that each of the remaining three properties are worth further exploration.
The list includes an existing home at 660 Main St. (offered at $95,000) and two vacant lots: one at the the corner of Cole and Maple Streets ($104,900) and the other on Summer Street, just off North Hoosac Road ($99,000).
"I'm really pleased with the response we got to the RFP," Trustee Stanley Parese said. "If any of those three had been the only one we received, I suspect we'd have found our way to do it.
"I don't have a strong impulse to eliminate any of the three."
Not that the trustees are interested in pursuing more than one. Pending a $75,000 transfer of Community Preservation Act funds coming to the Affordable Housing Trust in May, the trust's coffers will contain about $289,000 at the start of fiscal 2016.
The trustees do not want to spend all of that on land acquisition. They hope to hold back significant reserves to support a mortgage assistance program the trust developed in 2014 that allots up to $15,000 to qualified first-time homebuyers making up to 100 percent of the area median income.
By and large, the trustees and Austin agreed that either of the vacant lots under consideration would be suitable for construction of a residence. Both are already on town water, and each is large enough to accommodate at least a single family home.
The trustees were more cautious in their assessment of the existing four-bedroom, 1,374 square foot home on Main Street, and they agreed that they would like to arrange a site visit with the real estate agent listing the property before they decide which of the three sites to pursue.
Whichever way they go, the trustees likely will not see anything built in the near future — not by Habitat for Humanity, anyway.
Austin informed the trust on Wednesday that the local Habitat chapter is close to finalizing plans to build a home on a site in Adams.
"It would probably be about two years you would allocate to that project," Chairman Thomas Sheldon asked Austin.
"Yes," he replied.
"It would be a while before we could o anything with a property up here."
Tags: affordable housing trust,
