Town meetings/elections are approaching…

Are you ready to root for the Housing Bank?

 
 

THE PROBLEM

  • There is a $781,500 gap between what the average Island family can afford and the median home sale price ($1.15 million in 2020).

  • The pandemic-driven migration of seasonal residents increased the percentage of year-round occupied Vineyard homes from 38% to 51%. This only aggravated our affordable housing crisis - more need for services and less places for servicepersons to live.

  • Over 700 year-round residents and their families are waiting for affordable rentals, including 210 children.

  • Rents are 30% above the statewide median while wages are 27% below the statewide median.

  • 440 year-round residents are currently on waiting lists to purchase homes within their financial reach.

  • 21% of year-round Vineyard residents - over 1,200 - pay more than half of their income on housing costs.

  • Over 18% of the Vineyard’s 17,188 houses are used as short-term rentals (averaging $3,000 per week), exacerbating an already competitive market.

If we allow these trends to continue, the Island community will erode along with its shoreline.

 
 

THE SOLUTION

Our goal is to establish an Island-wide Housing Bank modeled on the Martha’s Vineyard Land Bank, with Housing Bank proceeds directly addressing the housing crisis.

If the island had a Housing Bank producing $12 million a year (estimated from recent real estate transactions) and with at least 75% used for re-purposing existing properties, it could do the following in just one year:

RE-PURPOSING & IMPROVING

•      Convert two existing houses into eight income-restricted rental apartments.

•      Fill the funding gap for ten income-restricted accessory apartments to existing dwellings.

•      Loan eight families $200,000 of down payment assistance to access market-rate homes.

•      Buy six permanent year-round restrictions on existing short-term rental properties.

•      Grant or loan funds for ten denitrification wastewater upgrades in critical watershed areas.

NEW DEVELOPMENT

•      Fill the funding gap for six income-restricted net-zero housing units.

Thirty-eight new housing opportunities and an enhanced environment. Solutions - year after year.  (Housing Planners forecast a need of over 1000 new units over 20 years)

To achieve this, four of the six island towns must approve, then pass a bill through the Massachusetts Legislature. Across the Commonwealth, regions and towns are supporting state-level legislation to pave the way.

THE COALITION