On October 16, 2018 the district was celebrating the Grand Opening of Natalie Gubb Commons – Mercy Housing California and Golub Companies’ newest 100% affordable housing development – and its 190 new affordable family units. This comes 5 years after the opening of Rene Cazenave Apartments – the 120-mini-studios project for formerly homeless people. The Grand Opening was the occasion to reaffirm the district’s engagement towards affordable housing and to celebrate the partners and individuals who made this specific housing project possible: The Office of Community Investment and Infrastructure, Wells Fargo, the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development, and Natalie Gubb – whose name was given to the project, in her honor.
Often attracting media attention for the great stature of its high rises and transit infrastructure, The East Cut is nonetheless the neighborhood with the highest current and projected percentage of below market-rate housing in San Francisco (30-35%). Between the Transbay Redevelopment Plan requirements and the SF Planning Affordable Housing Bonus Program incentives, real estate developers are continuing to build the 1,400 affordable housing units as part of Transbay’s redevelopment (out of nearly 4,400 new units) in The East Cut District. Although this percentage may sound like a piece of trivia, it is on the contrary a major element of this neighborhood’s fabric, as the large proportion of low income individuals and families in the neighborhood should motivate the retail landscape to be more eclectic, diverse, and affordable.
Despite displaying grand lobbies, fine materials, and out of the ordinary designs, The new residential real estate developments that you can see coming off the ground along Folsom and Main streets also have their share of below market-rate units: Mira (40%), The Avery (27%), 500 Folsom (20%), Transbay Block 2 (100%), and Transbay Block 4 (48%). For Gino Canori, Executive Vice President & Chief Development Officer at Related California (developer of The Avery), mixing luxury condominiums and affordable units has never shown to have a negative impact on sales nor from a property-management standpoint.
Interested in affordable housing in San Francisco? Read also the guide to below-market-rate housing by Curbed here.
