NCW Real Estate Blog

There was a meeting last night at City Hall to discuss the staff’s proposed action plan on affordable housing.  I wasn’t there.  I had another meeting in Manson.  However, the Wenatchee World was there.

The plan is three pronged, and a draft of it is available here.  It includes incentives for construction of affordable housing, a license and inspection program for rentals and regulation of condo conversions. 

I admit to being cynical about government agencies, or even non-profits for that matter, providing “affordable” housing.  The whole concept of affordable and government don’t seem like they work together.  Of course, I’m typically one of the people PAYING for government services that don’t seem at all affordable.  See the numerous posts on property taxes.  Wenatchee, your turn on assessments comes next year!

I questioned whether a license and inspection program will help or hurt the problem.  Apparently others did as well:

Several landlords questioned the proposed rental license and inspection program.

The program would replace the city’s current complaint-based system. A city inspector would routinely check rental properties for basic safety such as heating, hot and cold running water, fire alarms and electrical systems.

The city would charge landlords an inspection fee per unit, which collectively would pay for another city inspector, Smith said.

“Wouldn’t that be an undue burden upon the free enterprise landlords?” asked Mark Schneider, a member of the Rental Association of Wenatchee. “We want to see equity. We realize there are bad apples out there and we realize there’s something that needs to be done with those. We don’t want to be unfairly punished for someone else’s failures.”

The fee would be small, maybe $25 per unit, Smith said. For large apartment complexes, the city would cap inspections fees, maybe $200 per building for example, Smith said.

A few people said the program might further reduce the supply of affordable housing, because of increased costs for landlords. The financial impact to most commercial rental properties will likely be inconsequential, Smith said. - Wenatchee World

Director Smith is very generous with Landlord’s money and time.  Surely he must know that increasing the time landlords must spend with the City on inspections, and the increased cost, will do nothing to lower rents or increase supply.  It also won’t stop illegal rentals who wouldn’t sign up anyway.  So, once again, the folks who follow the rules will be penalized and those who don’t will get an even greater advantage.  I expect we already have code in place to require things like heat, power, adequate roofs and power to a rental.  However, I this license would provide money for the City to hire additional inspectors since the code enforcement they already have must not be doing the job.  These meetings often shade in subtelties the real goal of what is being proposed which sounds like a larger organization for the city to crack down on the landlords who obey the rules anyway. 

According to the article, a lawyer for the Northwest Justice Program (an affordable housing advocate group with lots of lawyers), Judith Lurie, also wasn’t pleased with the incentive program to build affordable housing being voluntary.  As many lawyers would, she would rather have a law compelling affordable housing construction since she believes voluntary programs just don’t work.   The Wenatchee World provides great coverage of this story and I am glad it sounds like it was well attended.

Tags: General Interest, Local //