'Urgency and hope': Avesta unveils new housing in Gray for median earners
Photo / Courtesy Avesta Housing
vesta Housing cut the ribbon this week on the first two homes for sale through a new program designed to designed to hep median-income wage earners achieve homeownership.
Portland-based nonprofit Avesta Housing cut the ribbon this week on the first two homes for sale through a new program designed to help median-income wage earners achieve homeownership.
Located at 6A and 6B Collyer Brook Road in the Cumberland County town of Gray, the first available properties are single-story houses with a shared driveway. Each includes 940 square feet of living space, three bedrooms, one bathroom, a full basement and an attached garage.
The listing price per home is $218,000, less than half the median price for a home in Cumberland County.
The program is called "A Path Forward — Homeownership for ME."
“A Path Forward is a program built out of both urgency and hope,” Nicole DiGeronimo, director of the homeownership and financial counseling department, said at Tuesday's ribbon-cutting ceremony. "Urgency, because Maine’s housing market continues to make it difficult for middle-income residents to find safe, stable homes within reach. Hope, because we believe that by preserving and rehabilitating existing housing, we can create real opportunities for homeownership where few exist.”
How the program works
Administered by Avesta’s homeownership and financial counseling department, the program is a new line of business that complements Avesta’s primary focus of developing safe, quality, affordable rental homes.
Avesta acquires and rehabilitates properties that are in disrepair, then sells them at below-market prices to qualifying households. The Gray properties are listed at less than half the median cost of a home in Cumberland County.
Philanthropic funding from Bangor Savings Bank and from Mascoma Bank Foundation helped make the program possible.
“We have taken houses that were sitting vacant and are bringing them back to life for new homeowners,” said Jennifer Hawkins, Avesta’s president and CEO who took the helm on July 14.
Collyer Brook follows a shared equity housing model, which is designed to ensure that families with modest incomes can access stable homeownership while also making sure that affordability remains in the community over time.
That can be achieved when ownership is shared between a homeowner and a nonprofit representing the community, between a group of homeowners, or when an initial subsidy is shared from one family to the next over generations, according to neighborworks.org.
In this case, the homes must be owner-occupied and the resale price is not set by the market, but by a formula that preserves affordability for the next buyer. The resale formula provides for modest equity growth so that each homeowner benefits from the reduced purchase price made possible by community investment and passes that benefit on to future buyers.
Additionally, buyers must meet income guidelines. For Collyer Brook, households must earn 65% or less of the area median income. In Cumberland County, the median income for a one-person household in 2023 was $90,860, according to MaineHousing.
Headquartered in Portland, Avesta is a nonprofit affordable housing provider that operates 100 affordable properties, more than 3,000 apartments and two assisted living facilities, providing safe, affordable homes for more than 4,000 people. An additional 1,100 new homes are in the development pipeline.
More information
Find out more about Avesta's program here.
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