SAN ANTONIO – Alamo Community Group hit the jackpot recently when the local affordable housing nonprofit was awarded $38 million in 4% state tax credits to fund the construction of Cattleman Square Lofts, an affordable housing project planned for 811 West Houston St. Having come out near the top of a recent Texas Review Bond Board lottery drawing, it squares away an important piece of the financing puzzle.
The multifamily project is one of the rare, fully-affordable apartment buildings that will be on offer in the downtown area. All of the 138 units planned will fall somewhere below the average median rent (AMI) for the area, with 21 of them slated for 30% AMI.
According to Alamo Community Group Executive Director Jennifer Gonzalez , the tax credits make up a majority of the cost but are part of a broader pool drawn from multiple sources. In December 2022, the San Antonio City Council awarded $2 million to the project from the 2022 housing bond. Gonzalez said the organization expects to land additional private financing in the spring.
“We hope to close in May,” she told the Business Journal. “That’s our anticipated closing. Then it takes us about 30 days or so to ramp up, get situated on the site and then start construction.”
Gonzalez thinks the Cattleman Square project is going to be a catalyst for other developments in an area that has not seen the same level of construction as other parts of downtown and the surrounding neighborhoods.
“I think it’s going to be the first of many projects that are going to start to come to that area,” she said. “And I think in the future, folks are going to recognize that the first one — the pioneers that came in, took the risk and leap of faith — was Alamo [Community Group].”
Construction is expected to start in the summer. Local firm Concept Builders is the general contractor and The SAGE Group is the architect.
Read the full story in the San Antonio Business Journal.
Editor’s note: This story was published through a partnership between KSAT and the San Antonio Business Journal.