DELRAY BEACH, Fla. — If approved by the Delray Beach City Commission, more affordable housing units could be coming to Delray Beach.
"It's like a small family type thing going on here, which is cool," Nick Sanchez told WPTV.
Sanchez lives in a single-room occupancy unit in Delray Beach with nine others. Each tenant has a bedroom and they all share two bathrooms.
"Everybody is very friendly here, which is great, with the tenants we've had," Sanchez said. "This is where I have my cooking stuff right here, refrigerator, sink and stuff is here."
It only costs $550 a month and includes water, electricity and Wi-Fi.
"It saves me a lot of money, probably a couple hundred dollars a week easy," Sanchez said.
It's called multi-tenant housing and the founder of the Florida Housing Innovations Council is hoping to build more units in Delray Beach.
"I knew there was a need," Kurt Jetta said. "The fair rent, according to the U.S. government, is considered $1,800 a month. So, you would need $54,000 a year to be able to afford a studio apartment in Delray Beach. You can just see that gap is massive."
According to the 2021 U.S. Census, 83% of households in Delray Beach making $35,000 a year, spend more than 50% of their income on rent.
Jetta told WPTV that because of this, a majority of the current tenants who live there were homeless before they moved in.
"The topic of housing concerns me greatly," Chuck Ridley, chair of the West Atlantic Redevelopment Coalition, said. "The housing options for the affluent is abundant. In fact, we're overdeveloped in that area. But for those who are working families, particularly those who are at the poverty level or below, the options are very limited."
So, he's hoping Jetta's plan to build more affordable, multi-tenant units moves forward.
The City Commission first has to approve the next step at a meeting on Jan. 4.
"I told a lot of people about it and they were so interested," Sanchez said. "They were like, 'Woah, I would move into something like that. I'm one person. I wouldn't have to have four jobs to hold the apartment I'm having.'"