Affordable housing preserved for East San Jose families

An affordable housing group is celebrating its biggest win to date after San Jose officials approved the permanent preservation of 18 homes.

The South Bay Community Land Trust has spent nearly two years engaging with residents, city leaders and the landlords at 1718, 1724 and 1730 Virginia Ave. in an effort to purchase the apartments and retain their affordability for renters on very low incomes. The land trust calculated the site’s purchase price and improvement costs to be $11 million. After securing a $5 million loan from the city, as well as additional funding from groups like Bay Area Housing Finance Authority and Destination: Home, the San Jose City Council approved the land trust’s purchase Tuesday.

Leaders of the trust said the milestone shows how far they’ve come since the group formed to protest the displacement of families in the wake of Google’s attempted multibillion-dollar campus plans.

Delma Hernández, organizing director of the land trust, said some residents have lived at the Virginian Apartments for more than 25 years — and all were thrilled to learn about the effort to keep the apartments at a fixed low-income rent. Some residents didn’t know their apartment complex was for sale until the land trust became interested in buying it, she said.

“The most important thing for residents, first and foremost, was us being able to acquire the property and prevent displacement,” Hernández told San José Spotlight.

Rent costs at the Virginian Apartments will remain affordable to the families who continue to live at the East San Jose housing complex — with affordability guaranteed to some families of four making less than $30,000 per year.

San Jose housing department officials said they focused on creating partnerships for the Virginian Apartments to be preserved as affordable housing after the city hired Housing Director Erik Soliván earlier this year.

“It is three apartment buildings that were built in the 1960s and needs a significant amount of work,” Soliván said at Tuesday’s meeting. “We’re able to secure additional funds for this public-private partnership to address and be able to respond proactively and comprehensively to ensure that no families are displaced.”

Sandy Perry, board vice president of the South Bay Community Land Trust, said there’s an average of four residents per apartment at the site, with more than 50 residents total. The land trust also purchased a fourplex on Reed Street last year to preserve affordable housing.

“Preservation is much more economically sound than new construction,” Perry told San José Spotlight. “The other benefit, probably more important, is this actually prevents people from being displaced from their homes.”

Josefina Aguilar, executive director of the land trust, also highlighted the economic benefits of preservation, and said construction of new homes isn’t happening fast enough to catch up with the housing affordability crisis.

“It wasn’t until we really worked hard to leverage different funding sources and explain the community land trust model that we were starting to get a lot more support,” she told San José Spotlight.

With the biggest political obstacle out of the way after councilmembers approved the purchase, Perry and Aguilar said they hope the process will lay the groundwork for future affordable housing preservation projects.
Aguilar said there’s about 40 community land trusts active across California, and they’re growing in numbers.

“We incorporated in San Jose in 2019 and have been helping to mentor the Mountain View Community Land Trust,” she said. “Our mission is to help others also establish themselves because it’s not a competitive thing. The more (community land trusts) are out there, the more projects they can capture and preserve.”

Maria Garcia said she’s lived at the apartments for more than a decade with her family of five. She said they are resting easier knowing they won’t be breaking the bank over rent.

“We’re excited to be part of one of the first land trust projects, and I really hope to see more because there are plenty of families in San Jose who would benefit from low rents,” she told San José Spotlight in Spanish.

Contact Vicente Vera at [email protected] or follow @VicenteJVera on X, formerly known as Twitter.