Montgomery County will add about 2,500 homes during the next 30 years for middle-class and working families who are being priced out of the area’s competitive housing market, according to a proposal approved unanimously by the Council on Tuesday.
The proposal, sponsored by Council Member Steve Silverman, mandates that 10 percent of market-rate housing in areas near Metro stations must be work-force housing, or housing affordable to those earning from 80 percent to 120 percent of the area’s median income.
Area median income for a family of four is about $89,000 a year, and about $71,000 for a two-person household. With those numbers as a guide, a family of four could afford to spend about $315,000 to own a home while a two-person household could pay a little less than $250,000.
Silverman said the plan would allow people such as teachers to not only work in the county but also to live there.
“I think it’s reflective of the fact that the housing crisis has moved to include the middle class, not just the lower class,” Silverman said Wednesday. “This is really an attempt to try to address a growing need for middle-class housing in the county.”
The qualification guidelines are scheduled to be set in December, Silverman said.
Under current restrictions, in a development of 100 new apartment or condo units, 13 must be priced under the county’s existing moderate income housing program while the remaining 87 are allowed to be priced at market rate. Under the new program, the developer would be required to add 10 percent of the number of allowed market-rate units: For the development with 87 market-rate units this would result in an additional eight work-force housing units, for a total of 108 in the building.
The initiative to provide middle-income housing is the first in Maryland, Council spokesman Patrick Lacefield said.
But developers have complained about the plan, saying they fear that it would cause them to lose money or force them to pass additional costs to market-rate buyers.
The plan will apply to new developments around Metro stationswith a density of 40 units per acre or higher and apply to developers of subdivisions of 35 or more units.
cmabeus@dcexaminer.com
