TAMPA, Fla. — The University Area Community Development Corporation is now helping create safer, affordable homes in for low-income single parents.
The TD Charitable Foundation’s Housing for Everyone grant competition recently awarded the University Area CDC a $125,000 affordable housing grant. The grant will be used to build two lease-to-purchase modular homes for single parent low-income families in Tampa’s disadvantaged University Area community.
For University Area parents like Ernest Loiseau, this could help dozens of families in the neighborhood. Loiseau says many families are forced to rent because they have no other options, but desperately want a place of their own.
“Everybody deserves that,” Loiseau said.
These new homes, scheduled for construction beginning in January 2018, will be built on brown spaces formerly abandoned or vacant, and will be accessible for $666 to $1066 per month.
“Low-income families face significant barriers to sustainable homeownership, which is a major vehicle for building wealth and economic opportunity. Through this grant, we will be able to change the lives of these University Area families,” said Sarah Combs, University Area CDC executive director and CEO.
Families will be selected from the University Area CDC’s STEPS for Success (STEPS) program in partnership with Safe and Sound Housing (S&S Housing), an integrated family and neighborhood strengthening strategy that works with STEPS to provide lease-to-purchase housing in the community.
S&S Housing also will provide these families with wrap-around services to include budgeting, financial education and a housing education component, with the ultimate goal of preparing these families for home ownership.
