In one of the fastest growing cities in Colorado, a push is officially on to build more than 5,500 new homes between now and 2025.
City officials in Greeley say the combined effects of an ongoing population boom coupled with a decline in new home construction during the Great Recession has created a significant gap between demand and supply.
To make matters even more challenging, the price of existing homes in Greeley have in recent years steadily increased. Earlier this year, the National Association of Home Builders reported that Greeley, with a median home price of $362,000, is now the 50th most expensive place in the country to buy a home.
In response, members of the Greeley City Council have given their unanimous approval to an ambitious and sweeping housing construction plan designed to address the problem.
That plan, the result of a housing accessibility task force that met for most of the last year, includes recommendations for land use zoning adjustments, reduced minimum lot sizes for homes, and detached home construction.
The plan is also designed to offer a series of public incentives for developers to build more affordable housing.
Additional new home construction may also be spurred, according to the plan, through an increased use of private activity bonds, as well as land trusts that could be used for shared equity home ownership programs.
Greeley officials are hoping that in a city whose population has doubled from the 1990s to more than 105,000 today, largely as a result of a booming area oil and gas industry, the next commercial boom will be made up of single and multi-family housing construction.
By Garry Boulard
