Q&A
Open Door program statistics and financing challenges
0:34:35
·
153 sec
Council Member Adrienne E. Adams inquires about the HPD's Open Door program, and Deputy Commissioner Kim Darga provides statistics and explains challenges in financing affordable homeownership projects.
- Open Door program created in 2017, has financed 10 projects with 451 units
- Last year (2023) saw 177 units financed with $73 million committed
- Main challenge is the high cost: $410,000 per unit for Open Door, twice as much as rental housing
Adrienne E. Adams
0:34:35
Thank you very much, Deputy Commissioner, for your for your testimony this morning.
0:34:39
And Welcome again to both of you.
0:34:42
It's great to see you all as always.
0:34:44
When I when I talk a little bit about the open door term sheet and program, how many projects and units have been financed by HPD's open door term sheet since it was created?
Kim Darga
0:34:58
So the open door program was created in 2017.
0:35:04
And since then, we have financed 10 projects with 451 units.
0:35:09
Last year was our most significant year.
0:35:13
We financed 177 units, which and committed $73,000,000.
Adrienne E. Adams
0:35:21
Okay.
0:35:21
No.
0:35:22
Since 2017.
0:35:23
Now what's prevented the numbers from being higher?
Kim Darga
0:35:27
Yeah.
0:35:28
I think there are some you talked a little bit about this in the testimony, but there are certainly some challenges in financing new affordable homeownership.
0:35:39
This is one important prong, the 3 prong approach.
0:35:44
We are also very invested in making sure that existing lower income homeowners can stay in their homes and can make improvements to housing quality and also very interested in increasing access through our down payment assistance programs.
0:36:00
For Opendoor and the other main program that we have that creates new opportunities, which is the affordable neighborhood cooperative program, it is particularly the cost that is a challenge.
0:36:15
We do have an extremely robust capital budget.
0:36:20
Thanks in part to city council's continued support.
0:36:25
And so this year, we have $2,200,000,000.
0:36:30
That sounds like a tremendous amount of money.
0:36:33
But, you know, we're also constantly trying to figure out how to do more The cost of building a new home through Opendoor last year was $410,000 per unit, and that's about twice as much as what we invest in affordable new construction on the rental housing side.
0:36:57
So I think, well, we're very interested in that.
0:37:01
We have to be certainly mindful of the resources that we have available and the very significant needs that we are facing.
