Low cost housing in Miami

In January 2006 Miami Dade County realeased a report prepared by the Beacon Council. The purpose of this report was to understand, from an economic development point of view, the impact of the housing affordability issue on the business recruitment and retention the report found that often even a condo might be difficult to obtain for many middle-income families.

A new report now suggests that low-income renters in Miami face one of the most burdensome markets in the country, with spiraling housing costs and stagnant wages pricing them out of their homes at a ”worrisome” pace, concludes a study released Friday by Florida International University.
 
Once they are priced out of gentrifying Miami neighborhoods, low-income renters have ”virtually nowhere to go” to find more affordable housing because there is a dire lack of lower-cost apartments throughout Miami-Dade and Broward counties, the study says.
 
”We’ve known there is an affordability crisis, but what this study is now pointing to is displacement and replacement,” said Marco Feldman, a research associate at FIU’s Research Institute for Social and Economic Policy and the study’s author.

According to Fortune.com the price/rent ratios must fall in Miami to return to normal levels.Ratio of home prices to annual rents in Miami in June 2007 was 27.2 (NATIONAL AVERAGE 22.8). 15-year avg. Miami 16.0 15-year NATIONAL AVERAGE 16.9.% Correction required –41.1 (NATIONAL AVERAGE -25.9).

In Miami, the difference between the cost of housing and the average income is among the highest in any developed nation. There are thousands of people waiting to receive housing. There are people mired in poverty, people with children trying to make a better life. And there have been millions of dollars that were supposed to go to affordable housing that simply never made it, because of a corrupt and incompetent government program. A five-month Miami Herald investigation found a series of botched projects and bad deals at the city's Department of Community Development that have trapped thousands in crowded, filthy housing.

 

On October 23, 2006, homeless residents and organizers erected a shantytown on public land at the corner of 62nd Street and NW 17th Avenue. Once the site of low-income apartments, the lot had been vacant since the building was demolished by the city in 1998. By reclaiming this lot for low-income housing, Umoja established a direct link between the people and the land, and staked out their right to stay in the neighborhood.

Starting with 10 full-time residents, the village quickly grew to a maximum capacity of 50 people.

At approximately 12:30am on April 26, 2007, one of the units in the Umoja Village Shantytown in downtown Miami caught fire from a candle which fell inside. Within moments, the entire Village, built from wooden pallets, was on fire and burned to the ground. Luckily no-one was hurt and residents began rebuilding early the next morning.

The land is once again vacant, this time surrounded by a fence, though the Umoja community still hopes to see permanent housing built on the site. A new project spearheaded by Max Rameau is petitioning the city of Miami to build 123,564 new units of affordable housing by the year 2025. Meanwhile, many of the residents and activists continue to meet each Sunday to cook a meal together, maintaining the community support generated by the village. For more information on the Umoja village campaign visit http://takebacktheland.blogspot.com/