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Mount Vernon Triangle is poised to see another all-affordable housing development in the coming years, with a groundbreaking on the Capitol Vista project set for Sept. 25. Located at Second and H streets NW, the development will transform what is currently a temporary parking lot into 104 units of below-market housing, ranging from studios to two-bedrooms.
Sixteen of the units will be designated for households earning up to 30 percent of the area median income (AMI), or $35,160 a year for a four-person family. Sixteen other units would be set aside for families earning up to 50 percent of the AMI, or $58,600 a year for a family of four, and 72 units would be for those earning up to 60 percent of the AMI, or $70,320 a year for a family of four. The project will also have 3,200 square feet of ground-floor retail.
A joint development team consisting of Dantes Partners, Spectrum Management, The Menkiti Group, and Bailey Real Estate Holdings is spearheading the project. The District selected the team in 2016 after officials published a request for proposals for the site the year before. The project will be built on 9,648 square feet of land currently owned by D.C.
The parcel, which the development team will rent through a ground lease, is shaped like a triangle. Vertical construction is expected to begin in October and the building is poised to open during the third quarter of 2020. The development costs are estimated at $60 million.
The project is being funded by $14.4 million from Wells Fargo Bank, $3.4 million in deferred developer fees, $408,000 in debt service reserves from the D.C. Housing Finance Agency, $14.2 million in Low Income Housing Tax Credit equity, and $18 million from D.C.’s Housing Production Trust Fund (HPTF), per the terms of a prospective HPTF loan agreement. The project will also receive $650,000 a year in Local Rent Supplement Program funding from the D.C. Housing Authority over a 15-year period, public records show.
Plans for Capitol Vista include bike parking, a club room, and a gym. The development was designed by Grimm + Parker Architects and is meant to be “an interpretation of Manhattan’s Flatiron Building,” UrbanTurf has reported. The site’s address is 810 New Jersey Ave. NW.
As development booms in centrally located Mount Vernon Triangle, some new projects are bringing affordable housing to the neighborhood. Last week, D.C. developers and officials opened Plaza West, a 223-unit all-affordable building with 50 units specifically designated for “grandfamilies,” or families in which grandparents are the children’s primary caregivers.
Capitol Vista is near Union Station, downtown, and several grocery stores and Metro stops.