City Wants to Create More Affordable Housing Through Selling Off Unused Group Homes

A plan to sell off group homes on Lebanon and Trenton Streets in Melrose and use the revenue from those sales to rehabilitate existing (MHA) properties—and increase the city's affordable housing stock—received an initial OK from the Board of Aldermen last week.

The aldermen's Appropriations Committee, comprised of the full board, unanimously recommended a special act put forth by City Hall that would authorize the transfer of residences at 499 Lebanon St. and 165 Trenton St. from the MHA—which runs government-subsidized public housing and locally administers the Section 8 federal housing subsidy—to the Melrose Affordable Housing Corporation, which owns maintains affordable housing in Melrose for low and moderate income families.

If approved by the aldermen, state Legislature and signed by the governor, the special act would permit the proceeds from the sale of each property to be partially retained by the Melrose Housing Authority.

Frank Giso of the Melrose Affordable Housing Corporation told the aldermen that the first $379,763 of net proceeds generated from the sales would be remitted to the MHA for the repair of its low-income family units.

The remainder of the sales' net proceeds would be used by the Melrose Affordable Housing Corporation to purchase two-family homes as they become available at a price that fits the model the Corporation uses to acquire properties. The Corporation, which currently owns nine affordable housing units in Melrose, expects to take in upwards of $800,000 from the sale of the two properties.

Giso said that other Corporation properties were purchased using a combination of a cash down payment, a first mortgage through , and a second mortgage through the North Suburban Consortium, an affordable housing consortium that includes Melrose and seven other communities.

"Our best guess, given the current price of two-family homes in Melrose, is that the Affordable Housing Corporation share of that money will allow the purchase of probably four two-family homes, in the 3-4 bedroom size per unit," he said.

The former group homes being sold include, in total, 16 bedrooms, Giso said.

"We’ll replace far more than 16 bedrooms on our math," Giso said of the plan to sell those homes and purchase new properties. "Closer to 24 or 26 bedrooms of affordable housing in the city."

If the North Suburban Consortium is used again, any new affordable apartments created by the Corporation would be designed for households earning 65 percent of the area's median income of approximately $75,000, Giso said, which comes to roughly $50,000 per housoehold.

Mayor Rob Dolan, sitting next to Giso before the aldermen, said that new homeowners in Melrose have taken older homes and rehablitated them, and hopes the same happens with the two group homes being sold, adding that the Trenton Street home is in "a wonderful neighborhood" and that the Lebanon Street home is "one of the signature properties" in the city."

"We'd want that restored and sold to a good owner who’s willing to improve that neighborhood," Dolan said.

Asked about finding another tenant for the group homes, Giso said that the MHA has spoken with the state Department of Housing and Community Development about alternative ues for the properties, now that they're no longer being used, with the last tenants of the Trenton Street home moving out this month.

"There honestly does not appear to be any comparable agency—private or public—that has an interest," Giso said, adding that former tenant EMARC, the Reading-based non-profit that provides services for people with intellectual disabilities, found it more cost effective to build new, updated facilities.