Helping families find affordable housing in Columbus

COLUMBUS, Ohio ( WCMH ) — Homeownership is a goal for many people, but it's not always achievable because of the current affordable housing crisis in central Ohio.

That's why the Central Ohio Community Land Trust and Nationwide Children's Hospital's Healthy Homes initiative came together for a solution.

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Twenty-eight brand-new houses were built and sold in Linden and 28 families have settled into their new homes that they own outright. Many of them are homeowners for the very first time.

"For me as a single mom, being a homeowner was not really something I thought I could do because of the cost of it," new homeowner Onesha Croom said. "You know, houses are expensive and then it's so competitive. It was a seller's market."

Croom, a single mother of two teenagers, moved into a new three-bedroom house in Linden about a year ago. It's the first house she's ever owned and it's a reality she never expected because of the affordable housing crisis.

"It's just a wonderful thing being a homeowner, having something that I can pass down to my children," said Croom.

Croom was able to buy her home at a fraction of the market price with the help of the Land Trust and Healthy Homes. The 28 homes in Linden were all sold to income-eligible buyers.

The Land Trust builds affordable houses on land the city of Columbus and Franklin County already own. This means homeowners own the actual house but lease the land, making it cheaper.

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"Right now, as home prices continue to rise, people sometimes can't afford those increases, but with our program, because we build the same home, but we offer it at a lower price point, it allows people to get into homeownership," Land Trust Vice President of Programs and Housing Hope Paxson said.

Croom said the Land Trust made the home-buying process easy, and they helped her get her credit score and finances in check before purchasing the house.

She said renting an apartment in Columbus big enough for herself and her teenagers was more expensive than buying a home.

"Fifteen hundred dollars a month for rent, $1,700 to rent a nice apartment in a decent area, absolutely crazy and I'm not even paying close to that for my mortgage and it's my house," she said.

Paxson said that is the Land Trust's goal with the initiative.

"We believe homeownership is a very important thing to achieve," she said. "If people are working and they are mortgage ready, what we're able to do is offer a home that's actually in a price point they can afford."

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Besides the 28 new houses in Linden, the Land Trust also has current projects across central Ohio, including in Whitehall, the South Side and Franklinton.

Learn more about the Land Trust and eligibility requirements by clicking here .