New rental units to address need

13-story project to bring affordable housing to Miami

The city of Miami has approved a project to create work force housing in Little Havana, as part of a concerted effort to encourage developers to build homes that working people can afford.

The 13-story project — called First & Sixth because it’s at the intersection of Southwest First Street and Sixth Avenue — will have 100 rental units ranging in size from studio apartments, to one and two bedrooms. It will have a fitness center, bicycle storage, pool access from the fifth floor and about 1500 square feet of retail shops on the ground floor.

It is expected to break ground Nov. 1 and be completed in May, said Kyle Merville, senior vice president of development for Eastern Atlantic Cos. of Miami.

The idea is to grant affordable rent to working residents who have been priced out of the nearby Brickell and downtown Miami areas.

“We’re very excited to be providing” this type of housing, Merville said. “Every single day, [people hear how] unaffordable the region is becoming because of increasing costs or higher rent. It’s something this community needs.”

Alfredo J. Duran, Miami’s deputy director of the Department of Community and Economic Development, said the city has been encouraging developers to provide affordable rents by providing financial incentives or, like with this project, by changing policy. In the case of First & Sixth, the city allowed for a more dense project in exchange for units on the market that someone on a teacher or secretary’s salary could reasonably pay for.

Normally, the city would only have allowed for the construction of 50 homes in the Little Havana spot at 35 SW Sixth Ave., where East Atlantic is building, Merville said.

“The city is recognizing there is an affordable housing need, a desperate need,” Duran said, and so has found “proactive and progressive ways to find ways to encourage affordable housing development.”

The income levels per household renting a unit — and their correlating rents — are part of a formula set by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and Merville said the rates — separate for “affordable” and “work force” — for this project have not yet been finalized.

If, for example, a unit is set aside for affordable housing at 60 percent of the area median income, a family of four could earn no more than $45,300 and would pay $1,178 a month for a three-bedroom apartment.

The $12.6 million construction loan will be financed by Valley National Bank. The project “ensures that more local residents will have viable housing choices in South Florida,” said Sachin Mehrotra, commercial lender for Valley National Bank, in a statement.