The Iowa Finance Authority on Wednesday awarded housing tax credits to Spencer Manor, a 52 apartment independent senior living community in Spencer, Iowa. Following this award, Community Housing Initiatives (CHI), a Spencer-based nonprofit that acquired the property in 2015 will complete a major renovation there.

Work at Spencer Manor will begin next year after CHI completes similar ongoing work at Sunset Apartments located a few blocks away.  Both of these properties serve seniors (Spencer Manor can also serve younger people with disabilities) and feature site-based rental assistance, meaning the rent residents pay is dependent on their income. 

"The Spencer Manor renovation is a second huge win for Spencer after we were funded in a similar way to renovate Sunset Apartments two years ago, and it's incredible to be able to refresh these properties basically back to back," said Matt Hauge, CHI's Director of Marketing and Communications.

"What this means is more of our neighbors have a safe, secure place to live in their later years.  Everyone can take pride in that," he said

Rental assistance makes living at Spencer Manor and Sunset Apartments affordable to extremely low income households, which is very important because Iowa has a severe shortage of housing affordable to people in this group whose household income is at or below $24,600 year. 

Among extremely low income households in Iowa, housing frequently eats up more than half the family budget, leaving few resources to cover medical expenses or other emergencies. In Iowa, about 22,600 senior households and 18,100 households with a person with a disability are extremely low income according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

"We need more apartments that are affordable for our seniors, but we also have to keep what we've got.  Spencer Manor was built in 1977 and the first part of Sunset Apartments was built in 1966, so both have built up needs we want to address," Hauge said.

For Spencer Manor, the Iowa Finance Authority awarded $507,104 in tax credits to the property each year for ten years. Community Housing Initiatives will work with investors to sell those tax credits, raising money to complete the renovation. Work at the property is expected to begin early in 2020.

"What you'll see us do at Spencer Manor is similar to what we have done at Sunset Apartments, which is improve accessibility at the property, address some health and safety needs, and add some new features to make seniors' lives easier like laundry in the apartment," Hauge said.

At Sunset Apartments, Hauge added, newly renovated apartments are already for lease with information available at www.sunsetspencer.com or by calling Community Housing Initiatives' Spencer office at 712-262-5965.  Community Housing Initiatives is an equal housing opportunity provider and its communities are accessible to people with disabilities.

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Southern Pointe Apartments is our latest new apartment community, offering 3 and 4 bedroom apartments in Spencer, Iowa.  The building offers larger apartments that are badly needed in Clay County and the Iowa Great Lakes Region generally, and it brings together a lot of what we’ve learned from almost 25 years developing apartment buildings that meet community needs for our neighbors in Iowa.

Recently, Casie Tindell from ASK Studio, our architect partner on Southern Pointe (and numerous other projects), wrote this article highlighting one particularly innovative element of Southern Pointe’s construction:  the use of an innovative structural panel to create the building’s outside walls.  It’s a great look behind the scenes of offering Southern Pointe to the community.  Here’s Casie with more:

Affordable housing and innovation often seem to be disparate terms. Innovation in construction is often synonymous with expense…the antithesis of affordable. Designers and developers need to challenge the status quo of construction to make it affordable. Innovation can mean cost savings. It is not a simple search, but one worth pursuing.

Community Housing Initiatives’ project, Southern Pointe, was led by construction director Kris Vodraska. Kris had a vision of building a highly efficient complex by combing highly insulated envelope systems in concert with high efficiency mechanical systems. Kris and ASK Studio researched suppliers of Structural Insulated Panels (SIPs) and discussed cost impact with possible general contractors. The SIPs method of construction has many sustainable features that would impact the affordability of the homes being created. The judicious use of resources in construction and the need for quality insulation against stiff Northwest Iowa winds are things that can rarely be changed after the open house. Making the best decisions for decades to come was the charge of Kris to the design and construction teams.

Demand for wood products has increased world-wide as other countries flourish during their own industrial revolutions. As a result, we are faced with rising costs of building materials. Prices can fluctuate wildly due to many factors, including increased demand due to natural disasters like hurricanes and floods. Add to this the cost of energy needed to heat and cool new housing and it is difficult to predict what the cost of building and owning a home will be in the future. All things considered, standard building methods are no longer as affordable as they once were.

SIPs combine structurally rated interior and exterior sheathing with a rigid, solid core of insulation in one composite panel. The sheathing is a structurally engineered oriented strand board (OSB) which is made from fast-growth trees harvested from managed plantations and self-regenerating woodlands. SIPs are structural, so there is usually no need for a framework of wood or steel studs. SIPs create a continuous whole-wall system with virtually no gaps, breaks or air infiltration that are current with wood or steel enclosure systems. The result is a tightly constructed building with lower heating and cooling fuel consumption and lower energy costs, while maintaining exceptional living comfort.

Technology for this kind of construction has long been on the drawing board among housing experts, but today it is a reality with SIPs at Southern Pointe. State-of-the-art SIP manufacturing is accomplished with computer-guided machinery and specialized software. This software converts building plans directly to machines which can quickly cut panels with amazing precision. After the SIPs are delivered to the job site, they can be assembled in hours or days instead of weeks. The time study publishing company, RSMeans, indicates that construction with SIPs can save 55% of erection time compared to stick construction. The reality of saving heating and cooling energy of up to 50% or more with SIPs is driving the SIP market today.

The use of SIPs panels allowed a condensed construction schedule at Southern Pointe, ability to work in harsh winter months and an ability to keep a project moving in a time of labor and material shortages. The resultant apartments have low utility bills and almost no outside noises can be heard in the units. The units will be comfortable and efficient for residents for decades with no need to add more insulation later.  Southern Pointe is proof that new construction methods can be used in providing affordable housing. The first costs are achievable and the long-term value is indisputable.

Construction photos used in this post are courtesy of ASK Studio.

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