The bottom line for homebuilders is that they can make more money building expensive homes than they can building less expensive ones.
But what if your town needs more of the second-tier-priced homes, those in the $160,000 range?
Those $160,000 homes are just what Salina needs, according to Salina Area Chamber of Commerce CEO and president Dennis Lauver.
As Journal reporter Michael Strand wrote in a story in Thursday's edition, there's more to growing an economy than just starting a new factory or expanding a business. Those employees you're bringing in or trying to attract are going to need homes.
According to Lauver, a study of Salina's housing needs said the city needs about 1,000 homes in the next 20 years.
To help Salina get there, the chamber has been working on a couple of plans with state and federal officials. One is a statewide loan program that includes a pool of money that banks can loan to developers at 2 percent below market rates.
That can allow a builder or developer to save $3,000 or $4,000 on the house.
Whether the builders pass those savings onto the homebuyer or put it into their own pockets is up to them. But at the very least, it might get builders and developers interested in building homes in the price range Salina needs.
The other program allows Salina or Saline County to issue bonds to pay for improvements such as streets, water and sewers in new housing additions. The bonds would be paid off by homeowners through property taxes, rather than added to the cost of the house and paid off as part of the mortgage.
So who needs a home in this $160,000 range? Lauver says there's no typical homeowner, but it might be a veteran production worker, someone who's been on the job for five or six years and is looking to move to the next level.
"This is not entry-level housing," Lauver said. There already are a number of programs for first-time homebuyers, and local Realtors do a good job getting out the information on those programs.
Affordable housing is only one of the things that affects the quality and quantity of labor. But it's an important thing, and one Lauver and others are hearing about.
Whether these programs and others will help get some builders and developers off the sidelines and involved isn't known. What is known is that if Salina is going to grow good businesses and good jobs, affordable housing is a problem that needs to be addressed.
-- Ben Wearing, Executive Editor
Member of the Editorial Board
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