Fixtures!

You *can* have beautiful fixtures in a house that is to be sold to people of moderate means. Check out these fixtures! And this not some leverage-up-to-your-eyeballs-and-wind-up-on-the-courthouse-steps price point; the house with these fixtures will be listed for under $100,000. Check 'em out!

Funky! Interesting! And did you see that shower? The slate?! It's beautiful.

Friday morning started out like a movie scene where you know that everything is about to change for the protagonist. After 3 days of constant rain and clouds, the sun broke through on Friday. I had the chance to eat breakfast with my husband and curl up in his lap before running out to my meeting. The drive to the target neighborhood curves around blocks of single level sturdy brick and frame houses built in the 1950s. Behind their doors many people who owned their homes outright were misled into horrible refinance schemes that led to financial ruin for the owners. Other houses, holding hopeful young families, were sold for laughable prices to people who were sure they would be able to refinance into more affordable payments as the market continued its meteoric rise. Now “For Sale – New Price” signs compete with bobbing Christmas deer in front yards. A young mother bundled up against the chill pushes her baby down the sidewalk around “Sell Your Home Fast” signs.

But it is still a beautiful day. Natasha Beddingfield is singing cheerfully on the radio and I am on my way to make lemonade from lemons. This is not what my job was supposed to be. I was hired to manage an affordable housing program. The program, devised by well-meaning people who wanted working class people to be able to choose to live near the city center, depended on the continued health of the housing market as well. The program sells beautiful, brand new condos to people making 80% of the area median income for a set primary mortgage, less than $150,000 for one bedroom condos. The rest of the market value of the home is covered by a subsidy from the city that the buyer must repay when she sells the home. At resale, the idea is that the city will get the subsidy back to loan to another buyer and the original buyer will be able to keep any increase over the original market value of the home. Even better, the buyer enters the transaction without downside risk because she if the market tanks and she sells the home for at least its fair market value, she will not have to repay any portion of the subsidy that can’t be repaid with the proceeds of the sale.

Now, however, with market values drifting downward and credit tightening, it’s hard to find buyers who make enough to get a loan but not too much to qualify for the program. It’s also increasingly difficult to find buyers who want to purchase anything at all, even with a guarantee that they can’t lose money. We understand. Houses in America are much more than shelter; they are status symbols, tax breaks, and most importantly, they are viewed as investments that are never supposed to lose value. The last few years have shown us that purchasing a house expecting much more than shelter can be a heart-breaking proposition.

Still, in the spirit of making lemonade, I joined up with the team: someone else from my office, the representative from the foundation and the real estate agent. The agent led us on a tour of what a renovated home could like and still be sold at a below-market price. Sure, the homes are farther from the city center and the landmark that stuck with me the most on the way there was the nightclub advertising “ThugNation”, but the area is obviously home to a lot of people who take a lot of pride in their homes and working here is going to be very enlightening.