Polk County has 744 vacant or underutilized lots that could be developed into residences for young professionals, single-parent families and others seeking affordable housing options, according to a new report, Housing Sites of Opportunity, released today. 

Nearly half of the lots identified in the report are controlled by faith-based organizations, many of which have large amounts of green space or parking on which housing could be built, the report said. In addition, 245 public or semi-public vacant lots were identified where residences could be developed as were 128 retail and office parcels with aging or chronically vacant buildings.

The report’s goal was “to explore unconventional options to stimulate creative land acquisition, to showcase transformative housing and promote regional collaboration and development tools,” said Johnny Alcivar, Polk County Housing Trust Fund’s director of planning, research and compliance, at today’s Housing Matters Symposium. 

Developing infill lots with residences, including duplexes, triplexes and garden apartments, could provide missing middle housing in Polk County, he said. The phrase “missing middle housing” describes small- to mid-size homes that are affordably priced for middle-income households.

The report estimates it would cost between $154,000 to build an 875-square-foot cottage residence to just over $1 million to develop a four-unit cluster of 1,320-square-foot townhomes. The costs include a 10% profit margin. The cost estimates do not include the purchase of the land.

“It has become increasingly more difficult to build these [types of homes] effectively,” said Jane Reasoner of Confluence. “There are zoning obstacles in place that [prevent the development] of missing middle housing.”

According to the report, there are restrictive residential zoning regulations in place that prohibit homes smaller than 1,200 square feet, small lot sizes and the development of residential within commercial zones. “Remove the obstacles; remove the hurdles,” Reasoner said. 

The Housing Sites of Opportunity project was completed through a partnership between the nonprofit Polk County Housing Trust Fund and local planning firm Confluence. The report was made possible by a grant from Wells Fargo in collaboration with Capital Crossroads, a regional effort to catalyze solutions that improve quality of life and support thriving neighborhoods in Central Iowa.

The Polk County Housing Trust Fund will be looking for ways to communicate with faith-based groups about the possibility of converting some of their properties to housing, said Matt Hauge, the trust fund’s communications and outreach director. “We want to do some outreach to let people know, if they are interested, how they could go about doing that.”

One trend in housing development called “Yes in God’s Back Yard” or YIGBY, highlights opportunities to leverage faith-based owned land to be developed for affordable housing, the report said. 

Hauge said the trust fund will also share with community officials where parcels of public and privately owned land are located that could be used for infill housing development. 

The report doesn’t provide “a new magic solution but it does provide a new way for us to teach and show people what’s possible with their land,” Hauge said.

Read the report

The new report, “Housing Sites of Opportunity,” is available online.