Lack of affordable housing continues to be a major concern for Winnemucca, but there are certain entities invested in solutions to the problem.
A request to defer water and sewer connection fees for manufactured homes at Carriage Court Mobile Home Community and Desert Mountain Mobile Home Park was approved at the Winnemucca City Council regular meeting on Sept. 20 (with all members present).
According to Zachary Weiner of The BoaVida Group, who has been working to create solutions to the lack of affordable housing in Humboldt County and owns multiple properties in town, deferring connection fees allows for builders to keep on schedule since constructing homes can have money stretched into different points of construction at different times. Connection fees cost thousands of dollars and the City stipulates through ordinance that they must be paid anew if connection goes unused for a five-year period.
“It’s been a hundred percent increase in just the material and labor fees for us to put a home in, without any markup on our part, we’re just looking for the space rent… We’re looking to diminish some of these costs if we can so we can make it more affordable for people in the community to lease or buy these homes,” said Robert Hoover, the General Manager of the Boa Vida properties in Winnemucca, also present at the meeting.
Weiner explained that there are two more homes going into Carriage Court Mobile Home Community and 12 more homes that will be constructed in the Mountain Desert Mobile Home Park—East of Winnemucca— in the next six months.
The costs for these connection fees are initially paid for by the builders, but is then passed on to the buyer at the time of purchase. Weiner estimated that it will be roughly 100,000 dollars in connection fees for the Mountain Desert Mobile Home Park, which all have existing utilities that just have to have billing turned on by the City.
Weiner explained that he wants to get folks in homes as soon as possible and keep prices affordable for buyers. Issues have occurred as the City previously failed to notify Weiner of fees for certain properties because of an update in software, which causes upsets for home buyers when they go to get their water turned on and have large fees due that would normally have been included in the purchase of their home.
Because fees for some of the Carriage Court properties had already been paid when the land was initially developed, Weiner asked the Council to consider the ramifications of passing these costs onto buyers when the City charges connections fees again due to unuse.
After brief discussion, the Council approved the deferment of 75 percent of costs until the final inspection, which, unfortunately, happens rather quickly as the homes going in are mobile homes, and despite implication to struggling homebuyers.
“The bigger picture is the cost of affordable housing,” said Weiner.