Sixty Premier Circle apartments will be built next to the 80-unit Vista29 supportive housing project (above), which is currently under construction.
In a community with as much wealth as Albemarle, providing new housing units at an affordable price can be challenging. Nonprofit developers use many tools to subsidize costs, such as selling tax credits for money that can be used for construction.
In February 2024, Albemarle County supervisors created an Affordable Rental Housing Incentive Program to add another method to create more affordable units.
“Under the program, projects can be eligible for a grant which is equal to 15 percent of the total taxes paid on the property each year and that incentive lasts for a total of 30 years,” said Stacy Pethia, Albemarle’s housing director.
On May 6, supervisors approved the first application to use this resource. The Piedmont Housing Alliance wants to use the tax rebate to lower the cost of 60 units to be built on Premier Circle next to the 80-unit Vista29 supportive housing project that is currently under construction. Pethia said the first units there will begin to be leased by the end of the year.
Under the county’s housing policy, an affordable unit is one in which a household pays no more than 30 percent of its total income. The Premier apartments project will be a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom units with rents capped for households making 60 percent of the area median income.
The total tax rebate over 30 years would be $400,000. This method is available to for-profit developers as well, but so far none have taken advantage.
“The fact that that hasn’t been happening with some more frequency for us to be able to figure these things out at the board level has been frustrating,” said Supervisor Ned Gallaway.
Supervisors will have a larger policy discussion about affordable housing on August 5
