ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. – There’s a new approach to help address the ongoing affordable housing crisis in St. Johns County and it focuses on filling the gap known as “The Missing Middle.”
The Affordable Housing Advisory Committee said during a presentation to St. Johns County Commissioners that nearly 60% of millennials are searching for housing that is currently in short supply in the fast-growing county.
“I don’t think [affordable housing] exists at all in Florida,” St. Johns County resident Mike told News4JAX. “Rent is like $1,600 a month and you got to bring like $500, $600 home for that then you’re left with like $200 for food.”
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The median sale price of a single-family home in the county was $600,000 in April, something that’s unattainable for a majority of the workforce.
Greg Burke is a local architect who sits on the St. Johns County Affordable Housing Advisory Committee. On Tuesday he brought an action plan for commissioners to consider that would create more affordable options for new families and retirees.
It focuses on “The Missing Middle.”
“The missing middle is defined as all housing types that are between single-family, residential and midrise apartments,” Burke said.
That includes things like side-by-side or stacked duplexes, fourplexes, stacked triplexes and live-work homes. Burke said building more of these kinds of homes can create more walkable neighborhoods, create community and they can be highly marketable to millennials, singles and baby boomers and serve as an alternative to a starter home or a way to downsize.
He said St. Johns County could benefit from the middle housing.
MORE: St. Johns County welcomes new affordable housing apartments that offer units 30% below market rate
“This is a tool that will require some zoning changes to allow for it. That’s our biggest impediment right now is the zoning is not in place to allow for this type of construction throughout all single-family residential zones,” he said.
This type of housing already exists in St. Johns County you can find multifamily homes and single-family homes in the same neighborhood. But the idea is to build more of it to meet the need.
“My understanding is we’re probably one of the most expensive counties to live in right now with our average home prices. So, if we want to keep the people who serve us, you know, everybody from teachers to nurses, our first responders, the people that work in our restaurants and our hotels, if we want to keep them in town and make their commute back and forth to work reasonable,” Burke said.
Earlier this month, commissioners voted down a proposal to bring 300 affordable apartments to the county. Residents were concerned about traffic and decreasing property values.
“That’s really not true,” Burke said when talking about the kind of homes he’s proposing. “If you if you’ve got a house let’s say 2,800 to 3,200 square feet and worth $600,000 to $700,000. If you build a quad next door to that, that are basically 800 square feet or 1,200 square feet and you’ve got four of them, in St. Johns County, the definition of affordable housing is a construction value under $260,000. So let’s say we do those all at $250,000. There’s a million dollars in four units. So, your $600,000 house is not going to be degraded. As far as its wealth, it’s going to it’s going to be increased.”
No decision was made about the idea, but one commissioner expressed doubt and said the recently implemented Live Local Act supersedes any local control on zoning.