Remodeling the Future, One House at a Time: Revitalizing Yesterday’s Homes for Today’s Realities

Representatives of a Kansas City coalition working to revitalize aging housing stock in inner-ring suburbs came to St. Louis Sept. 25 to showcase their group and its work to St. Louis area leaders.

The St. Louis County Economic Council invited members of the First Suburbs Coalition to speak on an innovative project that encourages home owners to modernize houses built between 1940 and 1970. First Suburbs members are suburban cities or parts of cities around both Kansas City, Mo., and Kansas City, Kan., and include representatives of local governments and the private sector.

First Suburbs was convened in 2002 with the help of the Mid-America Regional Council (MARC), an association of city and county governments and the metropolitan planning organization for the bistate Kansas City region. The coalition was the brainchild of a number of mayors of first-ring suburbs in the area who wanted to be proactive, stabilizing older neighborhoods before they slipped into decline, said Laura McConwell, mayor of Mission, Kan. The communities felt they could be more effective if they worked together on common issues.

The coalition’s priorities are modernizing the housing stock, attracting and retaining the retail base, and maintaining and upgrading infrastructure.

The group realized that, when it came to housing, the goal was not only to help residents maintain their homes, but to update them, making the communities more attractive to home buyers. For example, modernizations could include garages, master bedroom suites, larger bathrooms and open floor plans.

First Suburbs hired Piper-Wind Architects, a downtown Kansas City firm, to develop a set of remodeling designs that would be appropriate for the post-World War II houses prevalent in inner-ring suburbs. And so, the Idea Book was born.

The Idea Book is a compilation of photos of houses in the area, easy-to-understand text about general design considerations, a discussion of what people like and dislike about houses from the era, a remodeling primer and designs for improvements. The remodeling primer covers remodeling tips, how to select a contractor and types of financing. Houses are categorized as ranch, two-story, Cape Cod and split-level.

Although homeowners might enjoy the Idea Book, coalition members recognized it might not be enough to motivate residents to remodel their homes. There was still a piece missing to get the job done: financing. So MARC developed a request for proposals from financial institutions regarding loans for the projects. There was one respondent: Community America Credit Union.

Acting as a corporate representative of First Suburbs, MARC worked out the details of a loan program with participating cities and the credit union. Program elements:

• Community America committed a $2 million pool of home equity loans.
• Interest rates are about 1 percent below conventional loan rates.
• Homeowners can borrow up to $30,000 for 10 years up to 110 percent of the home value.
• The home value must be $200,000 are less.

Between February and September of 2007, there were 67 loans made throughout the First Suburbs cities, totaling $1.3 million. The average home value was less than $135,000. The success of the program prompted the renewal of the program for another year.

Presenters and attendees discussed how this program could be applied to benefit the communities in St. Louis County. We anticipate that the dialog will continue as a result of this meeting.