Eastern Eight CDC held a symbolic ribbon cutting event Tuesday morning to mark completion of a new home at 1808 E. Unaka Ave.
The home was built in partnership with Auburn University’s Rural Studio Front Porch Initiative and the Appalachia Service Project as part of an effort to provide affordable housing.
Eastern Eight CDC is a nonprofit corporation and certified housing development organization focused on fulfilling housing needs for low to moderate income families in the area. It partnered with Auburn’s Rural Studio, an off-campus design-build program that is part of the university’s School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture, in order to create a home that is not only affordable on the front end but keeps costs at a minimum in the long term.
Affordability was not only gauged by the cost of building the home, but also took into consideration energy efficiency, building durability and the contribution to the residents’ health and wellness as well as to the neighborhood fabric, according to the Associate Director of Rural Studio Rusty Smith.
The Appalachia Service Project, an organization focused on repairing homes for low income families through volunteer work, served as the contractor in this build and helped make the home as energy efficient as possible. The city also provided funds for the project, pulled from its community development block grant funds provided by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The home sold for $165,000, and the new owners are expected to move in sometime in the next two weeks. Both Eastern Eight CDC and Auburn’s Rural Studio stated they hope to be able to continue affordable housing projects in the area.
“It’s not just what the house cost to build, but what it costs us as a community if we don’t build houses like this,” said Smith. “It’s that cost that we call the hidden cost of inaction, the cost of not doing projects like this everywhere you can in the city. That cost is tremendous and we all pay for it.”
For more information on affordable housing opportunities, visit e8cdc.org. To learn more about Auburn University’s Rural Studio Front Porch Initiative, visit ruralstudio.org.
