Amazon Teams With Metro on $125M Plan to Build Affordable Housing in DC
By Keith Loria June 16, 2021 10:21 am
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Amazon (AMZN) is dropping another $125 million on affordable housing in the D.C. region, part of its $2 billion commitment to create or preserve affordable housing in the three regions it calls home.
The tech giant has partnered with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (Metro) on an initiative to create more than 1,000 new affordable housing units near Metro stations in the Washington, D.C., region.
“For COG’s 2030 housing targets, area-elected officials pinpointed the need for much more housing, at all price points, in the right locations,” Chuck Bean, Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments’ executive director, told Commercial Observer. “This partnership by Amazon and WMATA to create new housing that’s affordable and near Metro is exactly the type of strategic investment our region needs.”
The $125 million investment is earmarked for financing these 1,000 affordable units over the next five years, with below-market capital available to developers with joint development agreements with Metro, according to a statement. Out of the total amount, $25 million will be exclusively reserved for minority-led developers to develop affordable housing on Metro’s joint development sites.
“The partnership with Amazon will accelerate transit-oriented development, grow ridership, and keep our region competitive with other global economic centers,” Paul Smedberg, Metro’s board chair, said in a prepared statement.
The investment overlaps with Amazon’s Housing Equity Fund, a $2 billion effort to preserve and create more than 20,000 affordable homes in select markets via below-market loans and grants, per the statement.
“Housing and transit are the first- and second-largest expenses for most households in America, and Amazon’s funding will expedite affordable housing near transit, reducing costs for both, while supporting families with long-term financial stability,” Catherine Buell, Amazon’s head of community development, said in a statement.
Metro’s existing joint development partners are invited to apply for Amazon’s Housing Equity Fund financing and Amazon will choose which projects it supports with its funding. Metro will follow its required approval process for new joint development solicitations.
Other tech giants have similarly committed to billions of dollars directed at affordable housing over the next decade, largely in an effort to help with a housing affordability crisis they played a role in creating. The Bay Area, Seattle, and New York — home to Apple, Google, Amazon, Facebook and Microsoft — all of whom have committed funds to affordable and workforce housing, have some of the highest housing prices in the country and a dwindling proportion of affordable housing stock.
Update: This story originally misattributed source material. This has been corrected. We apologize for the error.
