Clients & Projects – Multifamily Housing

Introduction

We typically represent tenant groups who are seeking to purchase their buildings or to negotiate with an owner regarding management of building operations. In this context, client accountability often involves incorporating the group, helping to organize a board of directors, training that board in both corporate duties and the development process, and managing the potentially conflicting interests of residents with different levels of income and assets. A successful multifamily project usually includes multiple institutions and professional service providers, and it is the community lawyer’s role to help the group client select and then manage this development team. We go on to assist in the acquisition and development of a project by negotiating and drafting acquisition documents, helping to assess feasibility, assembling financing, reviewing loan documents, closing the acquisition loan and helping to plan the renovations of the building. Once the building has been acquired, we assist the client in converting the building to cooperative or condominium status and train the members in operating the building and their corporation.

Sample client projects

In the past five years, the clinic has represented 30 client groups, with 17 active groups in 2006. Examples:

• I330 Tenants Association.
  
  Description. In the summer of 2002, low-income tenants at 1330 7th St., NW (a 136 unit building in a highly gentrifying neighborhood close to the Convention Center) were faced with notice that their landlord was selling the building for $6,000,000, an amount beyond the imagination of most residents. Many of them had lived in the building through difficult years. As the neighborhood changed, the residents wanted to benefit and not be displaced by gentrification.
  
  Many of our client groups face this situation. In this instance, the students and their supervisor educated the residents about their choices and the process of buying and developing their property. We stood with the residents as they chose to buy and helped them through the acquisition and renovation process. Throughout it all, the residents played a major role in developing the property. In the process, they obtained new skills and recognized latent skills that they already had.
  
  The story has a happy ending as the residents entered a partnership with a non-profit developer, bought the building and renovated it with no involuntary displacement. Seniors, families and young people enjoy the improved conditions, control their living environment and have new sense of accomplishment.
  
  Tasks & accomplishments. Working with the tenant associations, clinic students accomplished many important tasks:

  	Housing Activity Map
  	Multifamily housing clients

  
  
  
  • Helped tenants decide on an ownership structure
  • Assisted in finding development partners
  • Negotiated contracts with the partners
  • Trained residents in organizational structure and operation, development process and community outreach
  • Advocated for residents with partners and others – this was particularly important in smoothing out a difficult startup period with the development consultant
  • Negotiated the terms of private equity investment
  • Negotiated loans from public and private lenders
  • Drafted bylaws, leases and house rules
    
    
• A Street Manor Cooperative.
  
  Unlike 1330, A Street Manor is a small building (15 units) in an outlying part of town. But much of the story is the same: a tenant group started out somewhat at a loss and developed into a group that can make and implement difficult decisions. A telling anecdote took place at the closing of acquisition. At that time, the building was only partly occupied; and several units were uninhabitable or in poor condition. The neighborhood was distressed, but residents saw the hope of better times for the building, their community and themselves. Shortly after closing, the vice president of the association approached us, quivering with excitement. We asked her why, and she replied that it was her lifelong dream to own a home, and now she did. She had just called her mother to tell her she felt as if she had just bought a palace.
  
  
• Capital Manor Cooperative.
  
  This 102 unit project is comprised of three contiguous buildings in a gentrifying neighborhood. It is the best known of our projects as the Washington Post featured it in a three-day series on tenant ownership in December of 2005. In a personal way, it chronicles the journey of a tenant group in its move from being renters to being owners. To see the story, click here.
  

These projects and others like them enable students to engage in sophisticated transactions and to master the analytical and technical skills needed to complete them. These skills will enhance each student’s ability to engage in a transactional practice in any setting.

Collaborators

• Funders
  • The Fannie Mae Foundation
  • The Ford Foundation
  • The Enterprise Foundation
  • The Local Initiative Support Corporation
  • National Cooperative Bank
• Government
  • DC Department of Housing and Community Development
  • DC Deputy Mayor for Economic Development
  • DC Housing Finance Agency
  • DC Housing Authority
  • DC Office of Tenant Advocate
  • US Department of Housing and Community Development
  • US Department of Agriculture Graduate School
• Community
  • Unitarian Universalist Housing Development Corporation
  • Washington Area Community Investment Fund
  • Various Community Development Corporations (CDCs)
  • Coalition of Nonprofit Housing and Economic Developers
  • Housing Counseling Services
  • University Legal Service
• Other service providers
  • Private banks and lending institutions
  • Nonprofit developers
  • Community organizers
  • Housing counselors

   

	Harrison Institute for Public Law Georgetown University Law Center 111 F Street NW, Suite 102 Washington, DC 20001 Phone: 202-662-9600 Fax: 202-662-9613 Email: see staff link above