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BC Workshop and Come Dream Come Build, formerly the Community Development Corporation of Brownsville, officially launched their DreamBuild modular affordable housing program in Los Fresnos on Thursday.
Dozens of people gathered under the high roof of the 8,000-square-feet open air steel building that anchors “The Farm,” the site on Old Alice Road where the energy efficient homes are manufactured before being transported to a site of the buyer’s choosing. DreamBuild is the new name for MiCASiTA, which itself grew out of the RAPIDO disaster housing program CDCB launched several years ago.
A number of speakers were on hand for Thursday’s event, including Los Fresnos Mayor Alejandro Flores, Brownsville Mayor John Cowen, state Rep. Erin Gamez, and representatives from some of the entities that helped get MiCASiTA/DreamBuild off the ground, including the Texas State Affordable Housing Corporation, the Texas Housing Finance Corporation, NeighborWorks America, Enterprise Community Partners and JPMorgan Chase.
The idea behind DreamBuild’s “volumetric modular housing model” is that the low- to moderate-income families the program serves can buy whatever size house meets their immediate needs and financial situation, and then later add more pre-fab rooms as their finances improve and/or family grows. DreamBuild also gives the home buyer, through a simple online app, an enormous amount of input into what the finished product will look like, from paint colors to bathroom fixtures to shingle design, exterior lighting and many more facets.
CDCB Executive Director Nick Mitchell-Bennett said his organization and BC Workshop have been working together at least a dozen years to “build and create communities all over the (Rio Grande) Valley.”
DreamBuild is meant to address the extreme shortage of decent, affordable housing for low- and moderate-income residents of Brownsville and the Valley — though the model is already going nationwide.
“Quite frankly, housing is becoming too expensive for middle and lower income families here in the Rio Grande Valley,” Mitchell-Bennett said. “Just five years ago the median sales price of a home in Cameron County was $167,000. Today it’s $270,000 just five years later. That’s a $103,000 increase over five years. … The clients that we work with don’t have that extra $103,000.”
The rental market is experiencing a similar squeeze, with fair market rent for a two-bedroom apartment at $965 per month, which is $105 more than a family earning $34,000 can afford, Mitchell-Bennett said. Volumetric, modular housing is “the way of the future” for affordable housing, he added.
“This is how it will be built,” Mitchell-Bennett said. “It’s just too expensive to do it any other way.”
Benje Feann, executive director for BC Workshop, said the design-it-yourself aspect of DreamBuild (via simple online design app) is about “putting communities and folks first, listening to them first and foremost.”
While the nucleus of DreamBuild is currently in Los Fresnos, “we have a commitment to see this model move out into other areas of persistent poverty across the country, and urban areas and all places where folks needs homes,” he said.
DreamBuild has established relationships with affordable housing groups in Arkansas, Kentucky and Tennessee, which are about to embark on modular home building of their own with DreamBuild as a guide. Representatives from the Arkansas and Kentucky were also on hand for Thursday’s event.
Mayor Cowen said the Brownsville-Harlingen Metropolitan Statistical Area is the number one MSA for job growth in Texas, which is a good thing though it puts a lot of pressure on low- and moderate-income residents trying to find a place to live. Cowen, who sat on the board of the Housing Authority of the city of Brownsville for seven years before becoming mayor, said that in 2012 there were 3,000 names on the waiting list for HACB affordable housing and that today there are 10,000 names on the list.
“We’re doing great as a city, but let’s not forget about the population that needs help the most,” he said. “They are the backbone of our economy. So it’s incumbent upon us as leaders to help work alongside partners like Nick to push the boundary on what can be done. … We need to incentivize affordable housing at a much greater rate.”
