$200,000 homes in the Bay Area? Yes, but residents worry their affordable neighborhood is changing

San Francisco Chronicle​

16 hours ago

Just $150,000 for a one-bedroom home. In the San Francisco metropolitan area, where the typical home goes for nearly $1.2 million, that price tag sounds like it comes from the history books.
In some ways, it does.
Built during World War II to house shipbuilders and their families, the Richmond neighborhood of Atchison Village has a typical home value of just $211,000, according to data from real estate brokerage Zillow. That price point is the lowest of any neighborhood in the Bay Area.
Many of Atchison Village's 450 homes, which are typically between 500 and 1,000 square feet each, sit around shared courtyards, where neighbors host barbecues or wave down each other for a quick chat. Fruit trees and rose bushes dot the front lawns of each property. The neighborhood is small — it takes just 10 minutes to walk across — and it's common to see both children and older residents taking afternoon strolls by themselves to the city-run park in the middle of the Village, which includes a baseball field and a small playground.
Tucked away between Interstate 580 and the Richmond BART Station, Atchison Village isn't just affordable, it's one of California's first housing cooperatives, founded in 1956 with the community sharing costs for maintenance and some utilities.
This setup, fairly uncommon in California, keeps housing costs low and makes Atchison something of a haven for blue-collar workers wanting a piece of Bay Area real estate. Many of the residents are retirees, with the estimated median household income just $31,000, half of the county figure, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
Most banks and other lenders in California, not being familiar with the co-op model, won't provide a loan for a home in Atchison. Unless a buyer takes a personal loan from the neighborhood credit union, where the interest rate is a whopping 12%, they have to pay that $211,000 in cash. It's a sum that, in many cases, only existing homeowners have the assets to cover.
Still, that's less than the usual down payment for a Bay Area home. And the monthly dues residents are charged — which cover insurance, property taxes and some utilities — are often much lower than the typical mortgage payment.
But after years of putting off maintenance, fund-building and other costs, can the community cover its expenses without pricing out its own residents? Some residents are worried it's already happening.
'It feels like (moving here) was the golden ticket,' said Chris Dunaway, a 11-year resident of the Village. 'Maybe now it's a silver ticket.'
Rising costs strain budgets
The roughly 30 acres that make up Atchison Village have changed relatively little since the neighborhood was built in 1941, due to the strict rules on alterations. Many of the homes bear their original wood flooring and exterior paneling.
'I felt like I'd stepped back in time,' recalled Renee Garabedian, who moved to the Village in 1990.
The community welcomed Garabedian immediately, she said, with her soon-to-be neighbors inviting her into their homes before she even joined the co-op. There are plenty of other examples: The group that cares for their neighbor with dementia, the cookouts in the shared courtyards, the extra set of hands on a fence project.
The neighborhood largely feels safe, residents told the Chronicle, despite Richmond's reputation for crime. Of more concern for many community members is the neighborhood's proximity to the Chevron refinery, which has faced scrutiny over flaring at the facility.
In other ways, the neighborhood has changed drastically. When the federal government owned Atchison, homes were only available to white workers. Now, Hispanic residents make up the largest share of the community, which has hosted an immigrant rights group in response to the Trump administration's mass deportation efforts.
Not everyone gets along, of course. There's been the odd lawsuit and the occasional restraining order. Tara Ayres, one of the Village's 11 elected board members, said the community's leaders have to juggle balancing the budget with being 'camp counselors' when disputes arise.
And few issues here are more contentious than housing costs. Atchison, like neighborhoods throughout the Bay Area, are up against rising insurance costs and other financial pressures. One board member, Casey Bastiaans, said her monthly dues have gone from about $400 to $700. Others pay closer to $900.
They could get even higher. A fire gutted one of Atchison's fourplexes in May — the co-op's first major blaze — and board members are concerned the neighborhood's insurance premiums will spike. The co-op's rainy-day funds are also far below their recommended levels, putting the community at further financial risk until those are built up.
The price of the homes themselves, or rather, of a homeowning share of the co-op, has also surged. Garabedian paid about $30,000 for a two-bedroom home in 1990. Now, the price for a similar home can be nearly nine times that amount, which also means a buyer has to pay much more in property tax through their dues.
A sub-$1,000-a-month bill may not seem like much to the average Bay Area renter, but for some residents, it's more than they can take.
'Many people have moved out because of that, or are in the process of moving out,' Garabedian said.
Still here, but different
Atchison Village is about as old as the cooperative itself. After the city of Richmond declined to buy the property from the federal government, residents purchased their neighborhood in 1956 for just over $1.5 million, or nearly $19 million in today's dollars.
Disagreements broke out almost immediately.
Within the co-op's first year, a dispute over the elections process led to two boards of directors being formed, requiring a judge to untangle the results. Not long after, the community's veterans got into a feud with the board after the latter cut their property tax exemptions to pay for neighborhood improvements.
And then there was the roofing fight. In 1962, the board decided to use the co-op's funds to pay for new roofs, a move that a large group of Atchison residents swiftly condemned as unnecessary and fiscally irresponsible.
'We don't need new roofing!' one picketer's sign read, according to a Richmond Independent article covering the protest. 'Are we under a dictatorship?'
The board soon canceled the contract, but not before six of its members were recalled (three were reelected just weeks later).
Nearly 70 years after Atchison Village's residents bought their neighborhood, housing issues still roil the community — and this time, it may not be able to avoid raising dues. A group of residents petitioned the board some months ago to soften a proposed dues increase, while other neighbors insisted it was necessary. A flooded bathtub led to an expensive lawsuit between the co-op and one of its members over allegations of negligence. The board voted earlier this year, over the opposition of some of its members, to temporarily increase dues by $24 a month to recoup an increase in insurance costs last year.
'I feel like we are paying for what didn't happen in the past,' Dunaway said.
Bastiaans said she and the rest of the board are exploring a number of options to address the co-op's costs while keeping members' expenses manageable. Ideas include surveying members on how tight their budgets are, purchasing a stripped-down fire insurance plan from the state and spreading out costs more evenly between members.
Whatever happens, Bastiaans is confident Atchison Village will find a way to move forward as it has in the past. But she worries that working-class families will no longer be drawn to the neighborhood as they once were.
'I think the Village will be here,' she said. 'It'll just be different.'