City of Brevard Takes on Lack of Workforce Housing as Transylvania's Home Prices Soar Past Buncombe's

Recent data also shows that nearly 1,000 units in Transylvania County are devoted to short-term rentals. On the plus side, a developer shares a plan to build a federally backed affordable project.

BREVARD — City of Brevard leaders began tackling the city’s shortage of affordable and workforce housing last week amid signs that the squeeze is tighter than ever — and news that it may be slightly eased by a planned federally subsidized affordable housing project.

The median home price in Transylvania County, $403,000, climbed more than $50,000 in the past year and eclipsed that of Buncombe County, “which has long held the highwater mark for the region,” according to the third-quarter market report from Beverly-Hanks Realtors.

The sales in that quarter, which ended Sept. 30, included a transaction that briefly set a record for the highest price paid for a residential property in the region — $9.3 million for a 160-acre estate on Island Ford Road, according to county property records.

The Beverly-Hanks report also counted almost as many sales over $1-million (14) as below $200,000 (18).

Billy Harris, a Beverly-Hanks Realtor, said he could have handled more high-dollar sales if not for the lack of available homes.

Residential building has been on the rise, according to county records, with 149 new home permits issued so far in 2021 compared to 117 in all of 2020.

 “This has been a record year for new construction even with the Covid-19 interruption,” said Mike Owen, the county’s code enforcement administrator.

But even this boom has not come close to keeping pace with demand.

The Beverly-Hanks report documented several signs of a tightening market, including drops in the numbers of both sales and days properties stayed on the market, as well as the inventory of homes available for purchase. That number stood at 96 at the end of the quarter “compared to 378 just two years ago,” the report said.

“We have not seen a slowdown in demand in Transylvania County, but we have seen a significant slowdown in sales in the last 60 days, and most of that is driven by the lack of homes for sale,” Harris said.

In one recent week, Harris sought homes for three potential buyers, “all with over a million dollars in cash, and they all left empty-handed,” he said. “There’s nothing out there.”

Short-term rentals are also occupying a considerable amount of the total housing stock — nearly 1,000 units, according to a presentation to the County Commission from Transylvania County Tourism (TCT) Executive Director Clark Lovelace.

His talk focused on the soaring occupancy tax revenue in the fiscal year ending June 30 — $1.85 million, an increase of 92 percent over the previous year.

This was driven by pandemic-weary visitors seeking rural destinations and outdoor recreation — and, increasingly, short-term rentals rather than conventional accommodations such as motel rooms, Lovelace said.

Bed-tax revenue from units offered on Airbnb, one segment of the short-term inventory, jumped 144 percent from FY 2020.

Overall, 962 properties in the county were available for short-term rentals, about 40 percent of them in Brevard, according to an analysis produced by a company TCT hired to track these properties.

The countywide total is higher than that of much-larger Henderson County, Lovelace also told commissioners.

But it’s lower than in similar-sized Macon County, an indication that the number of short-term rentals tracks more closely with the availability of recreational opportunities than population.

“We’ve got more playground than (Henderson),” said Brevard Mayor Pro Tem Mac Morrow, a TCT board member.

Workforce Homestead Inc., a company with long experience building affordable housing developments, is eyeing a 7.7-acre site owned by Transylvania County Schools near Brevard High School, Amy Fisher, of Fisher Realty in Brevard, told the School Board on Monday.

The company hopes to buy the land from the district for $650,000 and would build an 84-unit complex there with the help of several federal housing grants, said Fisher, who is representing Workforce Homestead.

The presentation was intended to share this information and did not request immediate action, though the project will eventually require, among other steps from government bodies, an offer from the School Board to sell the land to the county as surplus property and a rezoning by the city of Brevard.

Earlier this year, Workforce Homestead applied for federal low-income housing tax credits for its planned Falling Waters development on Rosman Highway, but was denied because of a lack of state contributions that would have expanded the grant program, and because of the high number of applicants, president Jim Yamin said in September.

“It’s just so darn competitive.”

Another obstacle to building on that site was the high cost of serving it with water and sewer lines, he said. At the schools’ site, on the other hand, “the city utility infrastructure is basically at the property,” Fisher said.

The project would provide units affordable to families with incomes ranging from 40 percent to 80 percent of the county’s median income. That could include some teachers “depending on the size of their families,” she told the board.

Though some board members expressed concern that this would not provide enough units for teachers, member Courtney Domokur pointed out that it would offer housing to families of students.

“It’s not just the teachers we’re attracting, but we’re trying to keep the families in Transylvania County and not (have them) move to Henderson County,” she said.

Fisher also said Transylvania County reached out to Yamin after learning that he had been denied federal assistance for Falling Waters.

That was to find out more about the obstacles to funding such badly needed projects and learn ways the county could help overcome them, said County Manager Jaime Laughter.

She also said the federal designation of Tropical Storm Fred’s damage to the county as a “Major Disaster” could lead to a higher ranking for such projects in the future.

The flooding destroyed or caused major damage to more than 30 structures in the county, reducing the already limited inventory of affordable housing stock, she said.

“We submitted a comment letter” to the state agency that distributes federal affordable housing grants, she said. The letter sought a “leg up” on applications for these grants from Transylvania and other flood-damaged counties to help compensate for this loss, Laughter said.

“My interest is not just in a specific project, it’s more in doing what we can to support the need for more housing, whether it be affordable or workforce,” she said.

That was exactly the focus of the city of Brevard’s morning-long workshop on this subject held last Friday.

Council members supported several long-range approaches, including amendments to the city’s comprehensive and land-use plans — currently being updated and combined — that would designate zones for high density developments with units available to a variety of income levels.

Zoning or other measures to limit short-term rentals — a common suggestion — would be difficult to justify legally, City Attorney Mack McKeller told Council members.

Council did, however, did take some immediate actions, directing staff to craft a policy to allow waivers of utility tap fees to developers willing to guarantee lower rents, and to survey the city for properties that might be ripe for affordable and workforce housing.

And maybe the meeting’s biggest accomplishment, said Council member Geraldine Dinkins, was cementing the city’s recognition of the urgency of the issue.

“I did feel throughout the conversation that my Council colleagues are warming up to the idea that the house is on fire,” she said.

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