San Francisco Affordable Housing Project a Go After a Decade

An affordable apartment building near Alamo Square is set to rise after spending a decade in planning limbo.

The plan for the 107-unit building at 650 Divisadero Street is moving forward after the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development filed a notice of intent to request up to $45 million in federal funding to operate the project, the San Francisco Standard reported. Under the proposal, developers would convert a two-story former auto body shop leased by a seismic retrofit company into a 10-story apartment building for low-income locals.

The site has been in various stages of planning since 2014, the outlet reported. Last year, the city approved a loan of $15 million for developers Jonathan Rose Companies and Young Community Developers to acquire the property from Divco Group.

Divco had planned to build a 66-unit development with 20 percent of the units set aside for affordable housing. Jonathan Rose Companies and Young Community Development, a housing and jobs training nonprofit based in Bayview, are sponsoring the 650 Divisadero development in partnership with the mayor’s housing and community development office.

Federal and city funding will complement the low-income housing tax credit equity that is primarily financing the project.

The development will have 27 units set aside for families experiencing homelessness. The remaining 90 units will go to residents who make up to 50 percent of the city’s median income, generally defined as one person making less than $54,550 or $77,950 for a household of four.

Jonathan Rose Companies specializes in affordable housing developments and has so far built 18,000 units across 17 states. The New York-based firm is currently building its first development in San Francisco, a 112-unit affordable housing project, at the Hunters Point Shipyard.

It won’t be the first time Jonathan Rose Companies and Young Community Development team up on a project.

In 2021, the city chose the two developers to build the affordable housing portion of the 88 Bluxome Street development in South of Market, which would consist of 150 affordable units out of 1,500 from developer Strada Investment Group. The project has yet to start construction, however.

Construction on the 650 Divisadero project is slated to begin late next year with move-ins beginning in 2028.

— Chris Malone Méndez