The AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust (HIT) recently announced an investment of $8.26 million toward the construction of a prominent 37-story mixed-use development in Queens, N.Y.
Hunter’s Point South Building A will offer 619 housing units, 13,500 square feet of retail space, and 250 parking spaces. The HIT investment will create approximately 195 union construction jobs.
The project is being developed and constructed through a joint venture involving The Related Cos., Phipps Houses, and Monadnock Construction.
The building is part of grander development that will be the largest new affordable housing development to be built in New York City since the 1970s, according to HIT.
The $233 million building is being financed through collaboration between city and state agencies. The HIT provided financing through the purchase of bonds which were issued by the New York City Housing Development Corp. The New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development provided $68 million in subsidy.
Hunter’s Point South Building A will be permanently affordable to low, moderate, and middle-income residents. Twenty percent of the units will be affordable to residents earning up to 50 percent of the area median income (AMI), 20 percent affordable to those earning up to 130 percent of the AMI, 27 percent affordable to those earning up to 165 percent of the AMI, and 33 percent affordable to those earning up to 230 percent of AMI.
Five percent of the units are reserved for municipal employees, including teachers, police officers, firefighters, and transit workers, allowing access to quality, affordable and convenient housing.
“It is critical to build projects like Hunter’s Point South that will remain affordable in perpetuity to address the escalating demand for affordable housing in New York City,” said Carol Nixon, director of the HIT’s New York City office. “This project is transforming an abandoned industrial site into a dynamic, mixed-use community, and reconnecting Queens residents to the waterfront. The development will also provide residents with neighborhood amenities, parks and recreational space, and close proximity to public transportation.”
When completed later this decade, the entire Hunter’s Point South project will be a sweeping seven-building, mixed-use development located on approximately 30 acres of waterfront property in south Long Island City, Queens.
The development highlighted as an example of strategic investments in Mayor Bill de Blasio’s 10-year Housing Plan, which calls for the creation or preservation of 200,000 affordable units. The full project will include approximately 5,000 units of housing affordable to low-, moderate-, and middle-income families in perpetuity, local retail, community facilities, an 11-acre acre waterfront park, and a new, 1,100-seat public school.
Hunter’s Point South Building A is part of the HIT’s Workforce Housing Initiative that was launched in 2009 with the goal of investing $500 million in New York City to finance the creation and preservation of 5,000 to 10,000 multifamily units that are affordable to working families, defined as those earning between 60 percent and 200 percent of the AMI. To date, the HIT has created or preserved 9,051 workforce housing units through its investment of nearly $286 million in 13 workforce housing projects.
