Programs Offer Housing Help, but Who's Buying?; Fewer Turn to Assistance as Prices Drop
In most of the Washington area, it's gotten cheaper to buy a townhouse, condo or house. However, the increased affordability has complicated government programs to help moderate- and low-income families own homes.</br></br>Each jurisdiction has a different emphasis in affordable housing, including both subsidized rentals and homeownership opportunities. In Montgomery County, for instance, builders are required to sell a few of their new townhouses or condos at cost to families chosen by the county. Those families can't make more than 70 percent of the median income for the region, meaning the limit is about $50,000 for a single person, $72,000 for a family of four.</br></br>The District occasionally provides tax dollars to groups of tenants in decaying rent-controlled buildings who want to buy and renovate them. The vacant units available after the buildings have reopened have to be sold to those making less than 80 percent of regional median income.</br></br>For instance, Las Marias, a condo conversion by low-income tenants in Columbia Heights, opened a little more than a year ago. One of the largest condos in the Northwest Washington building, priced at $363,000, has been on and off the market for a year. Two other subsidized units remain unsold there, too.</br></br>A three-bedroom townhouse in Germantown that cost just over $125,000 sold to a nonprofit group in April when no modest-income families applied to buy it.