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This summer, one of the largest affordable housing developers in Portland intends to sell 80 of its single-family and multiplex homes to a buyer it has selected but won’t identify.
The homes, called “scattered sites,” are single-family and multiplex homes that Reach CDC lease to low-income Portlanders at deeply discounted rents. Reach’s scattered sites are located in Southeast Portland, with clusters in the Buckman and Division-Clinton areas.
Margaret Salazar, CEO of Reach, says that for decades since the community development corporation’s founding in 1982, its bread and butter has been to rent out single-family homes at deeply affordable prices. But that’s no longer financially feasible for the nonprofit, due to inflation, high interest rates, and the lingering effects of the pandemic, Salazar says.
“This ‘scattered sites’ portfolio has become increasingly unsustainable due to the myriad issues,” Salazar tells WW. “We believe there is an opportunity to reposition these scattered sites as homeownership opportunities for low-income community members, including REACH residents and first-time homebuyers.”
Reach says that after the purchaser buys the properties—no sale is final yet—the CDC will work with the new owner for the next two years to help current Reach tenants and other low-income Portlanders buy the homes. To that end, Reach is seeking financial support from the Portland Housing Bureau and the Oregon Legislature.
But Reach tenants are skeptical of the nonprofit’s explanation—and say they feel left in the dark about what the sale will mean for them.
“Are we really going to get to stay in our homes, or are we going to just be another displaced statistic?” says a current Reach tenant named Christian, who for four years has lived in the Buckman neighborhood. “Being afraid is the most natural response to this, and we need assurances that we’re not getting.”
Sheryl Oldham has lived in a quaint, 1,380-square-foot house in the Richmond neighborhood for 54 years. Her Section 8 voucher pays $1,900 in rent a month. She maintains a flourishing garden and knows every single neighbor on the block.
Reach told her in a Feb. 10 letter that her home would likely be sold to a buyer this summer.
“I just don’t know what’s happening. I was just floored when I got the letter from Reach,” says Oldham, 78. “This community is like my family, I can’t imagine leaving it.”
Reach CDC owns and operates more than 2,100 houses and apartments across the Portland area. Like other housing nonprofits, Reach has struggled in recent years to make a profit. In tax year 2023, it made only $1.6 million, with total revenues of $30 million. In 2022, Reach lost $4.1 million. The former CEO, prior to Margaret Salazar taking over in late 2023, made $176,000.
Less is known about who is buying the 80 homes, which Reach says represents its “full scattered-site portfolio.” The CDC declined to identify the buyer, confirming only that it’s a single party and a nonprofit.
A Feb. 28 email from Salazar to Helmi Hisserich, director of the Portland Housing Bureau, offers slightly more information about Reach’s plans. Salazar asked Hisserich for up to $2 million from the bureau for repairs to the sites in preparation to sell, and for down payment assistance for people seeking to buy the scattered sites once Reach sells the homes to the “mission-aligned” purchaser.
Salazar wrote that Reach was keen on selling some of the homes to BIPOC buyers.
A formal partnership with the Housing Bureau, she wrote, would “lend credibility and help Reach solidify relationships with housing counseling agencies.”
On March 4, Hisserich responded that she was open to discussing “what a partnership might look like” with Reach.
The CDC has asked both the Legislature and the Housing Bureau to “cover the costs of home repairs and down payment assistance to make this model work for as many people as possible,” Salazar says, and adds the nonprofit met with other affordable housing providers to talk about how to collectively “seek funding and scale this effort to serve as many people as possible.”
It’s not clear why, if Reach wants to sell the homes to the current tenants and other first-time buyers, it would sell the homes to another party.
Reach spokeswoman Lauren Schmidt says it’s to avoid confusion for existing Reach tenants living in the homes. “This structured approach ensures a mission-driven transition rather than a piecemeal process that could be confusing and disruptive for residents,” Schmidt says. She adds that Reach selling the homes itself to current renters would be “too labor intensive, inefficient and confusing for residents.”
Reach is not alone in taking this new approach to balancing the books.
The housing authorities of Washington and Clackamas counties are currently in the process of offloading their single-family homes to buyers, too—also for economic reasons.
Washington County received permission in late 2023 from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to sell 60 of its aging, single-family HUD homes. The county said it would use the proceeds from those sales to “renovate existing affordable housing properties and build new, affordable housing developments.” Like Reach, county officials say they hope existing tenants will buy the homes. If that’s not possible, the county says it will offer the families ample relocation assistance.
Clackamas County plans to sell all of its 145 scattered sites this year to “organizations that specialize in affordable homeownership or to community-based partners that will utilize the homes for assisting households most in need,” though the county has yet to make any sales.
Washington County plans to begin selling its homes this spring. Basically, county officials and now Reach have contended, offloading homes will allow them to actually increase the stock of affordable housing.
In the days after receiving her letter, Oldham says, she sent Reach three emails asking for some direction on how to stay in her home, and potentially how to buy it. “And Reach keeps sending the same darn letter with all the same agencies,” Oldham says.
In a March 5 letter, Reach attempted to explain to tenants what led to its decision to sell the homes—and what would happen to the tenants. The CDC said it wanted to “maximize the number of homes sold to Reach residents, nonprofit community land trusts, and first-time homebuyers in our community” by partnering with the city and the state for additional monetary support.
Reach also conceded that buying would not be tenable for all residents.
“We recognize homeownership may not be an option for everyone,” the nonprofit wrote. “For residents who are not in a position to purchase the home, there will be a minimum of 90 days after the sale closes before any homes are [resold], along with significant relocation resources.”
Oldham, who has a lingering South Dakotan accent, apologizes every time she says something just slightly sharp and falls back on Midwest catchphrases to boot. She says all she wants is to stay in her home. It’s where she raised her children.
“I’ve built this place over my lifetime, and I don’t know where I’m going to go,” Oldham says, pausing to apologize for her cracking voice. “My garden and my pollinators. It’s just kind of weighing me down, and I don’t know what to do.”
Another elderly woman Oldham knows lives down the road. Oldham can’t remember her name, but she’s lived in her Reach home for decades, just like Oldham has. “I was thinking about sending her a postcard and seeing how she was feeling about it all.”