Workforce Housing: An Underserved Asset Class

Elie Rieder

SUFFERN, NY—According to Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, there are more than 43 million renter households in the US. These renters can be police officers, teachers, etc.— residents who make too much to qualify for subsidized “affordable housing,” but still don’t make enough to purchase a home or rent the types of luxury apartments that have proliferated in the past 10 years. As we speak, household growth is outpacing construction with more US households being formed now than at any point in the past 50 years. At this rate, the country would need to build an average of 325,000 new units annually through 2030 to satisfy renter demand.

“With workforce housing being a distinctly underserved asset class, it’s very fulfilling to help preserve the existing stock catering to middle-income households, while elevating the living standards for residents,” says Elie Rieder, founder and CEO of Castle Lanterra Properties. “We’re particularly attracted to assets within burgeoning submarkets with strong fundamentals, such as healthy population growth, highly rated school districts, high barriers to new development and positive supply/demand dynamics,” he tells GlobeSt.com.