SLO County housing nonprofit just reached a major milestone
The San Luis Obispo nonprofit that’s backed more than 70 affordable housing projects in the past two decades just hit a unique milestone: the payoff of its first-ever loan.
In 2005, the Family Care Network received a $283,000 loan from the San Luis Obispo Housing Trust Fund to purchase its first apartment complex on Halcyon Road in Arroyo Grande.
Two decades later, that complex has been a home to more than 240 individuals — many of whom are transition-age teenagers and young adults making their way out of the foster care system and into housing, according to Family Care Network CEO Jeff Carlson.
Since then, the Family Care Network has been able to expand into eight more properties that serve families and transitional youth across San Luis Obispo County, and it all started with that first loan, Carlson said.
“The upside to owning our own property is that then we’re not reliant on an apartment complex or a landlord to allow us to have those transitional youth or families in those units,” Carlson said. “There’s other programs like this that are all county-based programs, and there’s other counties where similar organizations are having to then find units with landlords or with apartment complexes, and it’s very difficult to maintain those units.”
At a news conference announcing the repayment of the loan, Housing Trust Fund CEO Jeff Eckles said the Housing Trust Fund has built on that first loan over time, with the total number of individual homes backed by the nonprofit now north of 1,700.
“This particular loan is special because it’s our first long-term loan,” Eckles said. “In addition to our very first loan ever, we’ve made 74 loans in total, and we have about three dozen on the books right now, so it means we’ve had a significant number of loans repaid, and that’s just proof that the model of the revolving loan fund continues to work.”
Family Care Network praises funding partnership
Family Care Network marketing and communications manager Sarah Davenport said projects like the Halcyon Road complex fill a critical niche in the world of transitional housing in San Luis Obispo County.
She said entering adulthood can be challenging for foster youth, who may not have had access to figures who can guide their development as young adults.
“We’re able to actually move them from being in the system to being in a transitional housing program, where they not only are moved into their own apartments, but start to learn all those life skills like laundry and budgeting and all those things we kind of, those of us that have family, can take for granted,” Davenport said. “They also then, like, have that safety net too, where they’re not going to lose their housing if they make a mistake, if they lose a job, if something catastrophic happens.”
Carlson said thanks to the help of financial partners including the Housing Trust Fund, the Family Care Network has been able to fully repay loans on all but two of their housing complexes, providing a stable housing resource for San Luis Obispo County families.
“It’s very exciting that we now own that property — no deed restrictions, no nothing,” Carlson. “It’s our property, and it’s great to continue to use that property now and in the future, not only serving traditional-age youth, but also families that are also in need of housing support as well.”
Eckles said the Housing Trust Fund is glad to have strong community partnerships to make more projects like the Halcyon Road complex happen in the future.
“It wasn’t just a loan. It was hope made tangible, a place where people can heal and reach their full potential,” Eckles said. “But the story didn’t end there, because the loan has now been repaid.”
