Affordable senior housing to replace ex-Bellwood Walgreens

An affordable housing development for seniors is set to replace a boarded-up drug store in the village of Bellwood.

Evergreen Real Estate Group plans to develop an 80-unit senior housing complex at the corner of 25th Avenue and Washington Boulevard, the Chicago Business Journal reported.

Bellwood Senior Apartments will replace the Walgreens at 542 25th Avenue, which has been closed for about five years, Evergreen’s David Block told the outlet. The village of Bellwood bought the 73,000-square-foot site and contributed the land to the $30 million housing project.

The development will be a four-story building with 76 one-bedroom and four two-bedroom “independent living” apartments for seniors with incomes at or below 60 percent of the area’s median income of $63,000. Monthly rent rates are set to range from $775 to $1,100.

The building will include on-site laundry, community and storage rooms, parking and intercom entry systems. Block estimates construction should be completed in July 2023 and contribute to the limited supply of affordable housing in the Chicago area.

“Like the rest of the country, the Chicago area has a severe shortage of affordable housing, and options are especially limited for seniors who are living on a fixed income,” he said. “For them, communities like Bellwood are a lifeline that allows them to be part of a community close to family and friends.”

Further west, in Aurora, the city set aside $400,000 of its Community Development Block Grant funds to renovate a senior housing development in the former Aurora Hotel. The property transformed from an historic former hotel into affordable senior housing in 1996. Now, with the pandemic driving down the development’s occupancy rate, it needs funds from the city to make necessary upgrades.

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[CBJ] — Victoria Pruitt