BeLoved takes Asheville's housing crisis into its own hands. What else is being done?

ASHEVILLE - Inside one of BeLoved Village's tiny homes, under the vaulted A-frame roof, Ponkho Bermejo can point to the first wall he built on his own. It's been a year since the development broke ground, and in that time, BeLoved Asheville co-directors Bermejo and Amy Cantrell have gone from learning the ropes of construction, to teaching others how to build alongside them.

"We are living in the impossible," Bermejo said. When they started, "no one thought we could do this."

The village proposes 12 tiny homes, 440-649 square feet, to target deep affordability: 30%-40% area median income. That's a single-person household earning $23,800 or below and encompasses the people lost in the "housing gap," Cantrell said, in a city where rents are the highest in the state, and jumped 36% in less than two years.

Where an acre of dense bamboo once crowded a sloping site in East Asheville, BeLoved Village is underway. They've seen over a thousand volunteers, what Cantrell described as a true community build.

She has a drill in hand as she walked the gravel and red clay bank of the site in July. On the hillside, about half a dozen people were clearing bamboo, the air perfumed with saw dust and the whine of power tools.

Much of BeLoved's work centers on support for unhoused communities, and Cantrell said a public application for the units will open in the coming months. A community committee will be behind the selection process, with representatives who have experienced homelessness and others that "reflect the diversity of the community," she said. To qualify, someone must meet the AMI range, want to live in a neighborhood environment and share their "housing story."

Cantrell imagines unhoused people, older individuals on a fixed income, young people struggling in the workforce, or those facing gentrification will be among the village's future residents.

According to Asheville's most recent point in time count, conducted in January, there are 573 people experiencing homelessness in Asheville and Buncombe County, down from 637 in 2022. Of those currently homeless, 171 are unsheltered, which is also down from last year's numbers of 232, but still higher than pre-pandemic counts.

There is a sense of urgency behind the project, and a joy in the drive toward the finish line. Proudly standing in front of the first wall that he built, surrounded by those he built after, Bermejo said they got tired of waiting for something to be done, and decided to do it themselves.

“That’s what is so powerful, getting so many people in the community involved so that people recognize, ‘Hey, we can do this.’ It’s possible to solve the housing crisis, we can do it together," Cantrell said.

More: BeLoved Village breaks ground in Asheville; advocates take housing crisis into own hands

End date in sight?

At the BeLoved Village site on Corazón Place, within sight of Tunnel Road, there is the framing, and in one instance a final product, for six microhomes. The seventh has a foundation, and footers for the next five homes will be set in the coming weeks. With a recently awarded $195,000 from Lowe's Hometowns national grant program, Cantrell said the construction timeline has accelerated, with completion projected for the end of the year.

Cantrell said they were nominated for the grant by "one of our friends on the street," and were invited to apply. They were chosen from among 2,000 other applicants.

“We are super thrilled to bring this national grant home to Asheville, and we’re really proud. This is what we consider a national model solution to the housing crisis,” she said.

Plans for the village extend beyond a single property. Cantrell says they hope to replicate the model elsewhere in Asheville, and see it taken beyond Western North Carolina as well. With no city or county money subsidizing the project's affordability, Cantrell said they've found the way to make the numbers work.

In previous Citizen Times coverage, Cantrell anticipated the building cost of each unit to be $94,700, but with so much volunteer labor, supplies and pro bono work, the true cost will be much less, she said.

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BeLoved Village has been in the works since 2017 and broke ground in early July 2022. The 1.22-acre parcel was donated by Land of the Sky United Church of Christ, which sits on an adjoining property.

A $1.2-million project, the units are fully furnished and equipped with full kitchens, bathrooms and a washer and dryer. All of the builds are two-bedroom, some with a second story, others with a loft, with the exception of the one-bedroom model home, built in 2020.

“There’s a lot of permanent housing going up that doesn’t have all that infrastructure, so I wonder, how do people live permanently when you’ve got a burner store and a dorm-size refrigerator?” Cantrell said.

“We wanted to really imbue this model with dignity, the feeling of home that folks really described that they wanted. … You’re looking for not only a housing solution that works, that has deep affordability, but that has that long term part in terms of helping people put down roots."

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Nearly 200 units of housing for 'chronically homeless' are on the way

As BeLoved Village looks ahead to an end-of-year finish, two other projects targeting deeply vulnerable populations are also nearing completion.

Compass Point Village, Homeward Bound's conversion of a Days Inn into 85 units of permanent supportive housing, is scheduled to open in early September for staff to move in, said Eleanor Asheton, the nonprofit's senior resource development director. Residents will begin moving in late September on a staggered basis.

Permanent supportive housing differs from other "housing first" interventions by combining affordable housing with on-site support services, such as case management, job training, medical care and more. Those who are chronically homeless, meaning they have been homeless for more than a year, are eligible for the housing.

Another 113 units of permanent supportive housing, this time a Ramada Inn conversion project, is projecting occupancy by the end of the year, said Emily Ball, the city's homeless strategy division manager.

The project is led by California-based, for-profit developer Shangri-La Industries, in partnership with another California based company and nonprofit Step Up, Inc.

This means 198 units of permanent supportive housing are "on the near horizon," Ball said. "That's a game changer for our community landscape."

Though BeLoved Village is constructing permanent housing, and eligibility is based around area median incomes, not necessarily the length of time spent homeless, she is hopeful that between all of the projects they will "make a ripple" in the community's need.

“We have never had an infusion of permanent supportive housing on this scale in our community’s history," Ball said. "It’s coming at a time when we have critical need, and so certainly I would expect that a majority of people who end up housed in those locations are people who are currently unsheltered, it should drastically change the need across our community.”

Sarah Honosky is the city government reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA TODAY Network. News Tips? Email shonosky@citizentimes.com or message on Twitter at @slhonosky. Please support local, daily journalism with a subscription to the Citizen Times.

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: 'Deeply affordable' BeLoved Village tiny homes take shape in Asheville