A safe, stable home is one of the most basic human needs and a cornerstone of economic opportunity – and during the coronavirus pandemic, a home to shelter in can be lifesaving. SFF’s Bay Area Community Impact Fund is investing $5 million in an innovative fund to keep Bay Area residents in their homes and to build more homes that are affordable for Bay Area families.
This loan to the Bay’s Future Fund is the largest loan to date made by our Bay Area Community Impact Fund. This significant investment underscores SFF’s strong commitment to preserve and produce affordable housing at a regional scale and reflects the substantial need for low-cost investments to get affordable housing projects off the ground.
Investing in housing: Partnership for the Bay’s Future
The Bay’s Future Fund is part of the investment arm of the Partnership for the Bay’s Future collaborative, created by the San Francisco Foundation and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative along with a number of other funders and partners. The Partnership for the Bay’s Future helps make homes more affordable across the Bay Area with a unique dual approach: it works to advance policy changes that protect residents and improve affordability and it invests in building new and rehabilitating existing affordable homes—always through a lens of racial equity and economic inclusion.
The Bay’s Future Fund finances projects from supportive housing for people who are unhoused to mixed-income housing that supports below-market rents without subsidies. The fund aims to improve housing choices for people across the income spectrum, from those making extremely low incomes to those with moderate incomes. With its innovative and flexible loan products, the Bay’s Future Fund fills capital gaps and expands our affordable housing stock.
Bay’s Future Fund projects
One of the first loans made by the Bay’s Future Fund is to a partnership between the Bay Area Community Land Trust and the McGee Avenue Baptist Church. With this financing, the Bay Area Community Land Trust will restore an 8-unit church-owned property that had previously sat vacant for decades. The Land Trust and the Church will rent out the renovated apartments at affordable rates and establish co-op ownership for the residents.
The Bay’s Future Fund also provided a loan to a local community organization—the Unity Council—to purchase two apartment buildings on 36th Avenue in the Fruitvale neighborhood of Oakland that house 25 families. This acquisition will ensure that all the apartments will remain affordable to families making below 80% of the area median income (AMI)—with the majority affordable for families making below 50% of AMI. Every existing tenant will remain in place. The Unity Council will offer critical social services to the residents, including employment services, free tax guidance and a Head Start program.
SFF and other investors in the Bay’s Future Fund will help the Partnership for the Bay’s Future reach its ambitious goal to preserve and produce more than 8,000 homes in the Bay Area.
Impact investing for the Bay Area
The San Francisco Foundation has invested $15 million in our Bay Area Community Impact Fund, and donors have co-invested alongside us—allocating a portion of their DAFs to local impact. The Fund has invested in the Bay Area for more than a decade through low-interest, long-term loans to local organizations and projects that align with the foundation’s values and goals. Our investments help build affordable housing, grow small businesses, create good jobs, and strengthen the organizations that serve our communities. As community organizations pay back the loans, we recycle the funds into new investments and repay the donors and institutions who invest in the fund.
Learn more about the Bay Area Community Impact Fund and the investments it has made.
San Francisco Foundation donors interested in investing funds for local impact can contact your Philanthropic Advisor or email us at donorservices[at]sff.org
BACIF Impacts — Bay Area
