Group working to make buying a home more affordable in Uniondale with housing lottery
UNIONDALE, Long Island (WABC) -- An affordable housing nonprofit on Long Island is working to make buying a house more affordable.
Now a two-story, three-bedroom brick colonial home could be yours for about half of the going housing price in Uniondale.
Uniondale Community Land Trust was birthed out of the blight on the 2009 housing crisis.
Nonprofit president Anestoria Shalkowski is allowing first-time homebuyers the chance to apply to buy a home for about $285,000 through a lottery. That is about half the cost of the current average $600,000 home in Uniondale.
"One of the things that we do is to ensure that the mortgage, or what they will be paying, is not more than a third of their income, monthly income," Shalkowski said.
The first home the nonprofit gave away was a gut rehab in Uniondale which was sold in 2021.
Their second project is starting from the ground up. The 1,500-square-foot home will be what's called modular, meaning it will be built offsite by Simplex Homes in Pennsylvania before being transported to the Uniondale plot of land.
"We've decided to do a modular structure because Uniondale Avenue is a busy thoroughfare and so we were to do a regular stick build, it would cause congestion," Shalkowski said.
Walter Oden is the developer.
"I am absolutely thrilled that I have an opportunity to play a small role in this development," Oden said. "It will be put together in one day and then over the next six months we'll finish it."
The deadline for the lottery is Monday, Feb. 24, you can apply on the Uniondale Community Land Trust's website.
The winner will buy the home but lease the land from the nonprofit, which prevents the buyer from flipping it or quickly selling the house at a profit.
The group hopes to sell more houses to other families.
"We are trying our best, there are a lot of people who went to school here, who had to move because they can't afford the current state of homes in the community, and so we are looking at all opportunities that we can get," Shalkowski said.
That new house will be brought to the lot and will be ready to be moved in by September.
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