New York City Housing officials, SKA Marin and Local Development of Crown Heights recently celebrated the grand opening of Crown Heights Apartments, an eight-story affordable housing development in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. The complex offers 143 affordable rental units for low-income seniors and was constructed through HDC’s Low Income Affordable Market Place Program (“LAMP”). Crown Heights Apartments was financed through a public-private partnership that included $22.2 million of tax-exempt bonds issued by the New York City Housing Development Corporation (“NYCHDC”) which were in turn backed by a $22.4 million Citi Letter of Credit (“LC”). Additional sources of financing include $10.7 million of subordinate financing from NYCHDC and The New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development (NYCHPD), $18.1 million of Low Income Housing Tax Credits syndicated by Boston Financial Investment Management, and $3,750,000 of City Council funds. Construction began in January 2008 and was completed earlier this year.
Crown Heights Apartments was developed under Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s New Housing Marketplace Plan (NHMP) to finance the creation or preservation of 165,000 affordable homes by 2014. LAMP provides financing for affordable rental housing reserved for tenants earning a maximum income of up to $29,760 for an individual (or 50 percent AMI). As such, each unit in Crown Heights Apartments is leased at an affordable rent as a direct result of the favorable financing offered through HDC and 132 of the units are currently occupied.
