328 new apartments open in Beaufort. Here’s what you get for $1,600 a month
Owners of a new 328-unit “workforce” apartment complex in Beaufort say its units will be attainable for “doers” who are earning decent pay but still priced out of the local housing market.
U.S. Sen. Tim Scott, R-SC, who is working on legislation he says would increase the supply of affordable housing across the country, was in Beaufort Friday to highlight the Pointe Grand project. Developers, he said, considered affordability, not just profitability.
Pointe Grand, which officially opened Friday, is located at 135 Hillpointe Circle, across Burton Hill Road from Lowe’s Home Improvement. It hits the local market at a time when construction and approval of apartments in Beaufort is happening quickly — to the concern of some residents — and as a debate over the cost of living takes shape nationally ahead of this year’s midterm elections.
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‘It’s a serious crisis’
Hillpointe, a Winter Park, Florida-based real estate and investment firm, is focused on building market-rate workforce housing that is “attainable” for people with incomes starting around $50,000 per year across the Sun Belt, Steven Campisi, a Hillpointe executive, said at the Friday opening celebration.
Campisi described the tenants Pointe Grand will serve as “doers” who don’t qualify for subsidized housing but can’t afford to buy a house or rent a luxury apartment. That category of renter deserves a quality place to live, he said, but options are limited.
“It’s a serious crisis across our nation. We can’t provide attainable housing to our doers,” Campisi said.
Pointe Grand stands out because only two-bedroom, two-bath apartments are available for rent. The units are intentionally designed for sharing with a roommate, said Kelly Mahoney, another Hillpointe executive. The $1,600 monthly rent for the two-bedroom apartments is about 20%, or $300 to $400, less than the average lease in the Beaufort area, Mahoney said.
Campisi and Mahoney first visited Beaufort County six or seven years ago, Campisi said. The rise in the cost of living jumped out at them, Campisi said.
“We came because there is such a need for attainable housing,” Campisi said.
Hillpointe has built 20,000 apartment units. But the Beaufort project was its most difficult to date, the Hillpointe officials noted, with the entire project taking two years to complete. It took a year to get approval and another year for construction, Campisi said.
Hillpointe officials cited the city’s long approval process and special requirements for the delay in getting the apartment project shovel-ready.
These types of delays and extra conditions are particularly challenging for market-rate developers investing in workforce housing, they noted, because they can’t easily pass on added costs to renters seeking lower rents.
‘American Dream issue’
Scott, who is chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, is the primary sponsor of the Renewing Opportunity in the American Dream to Housing ACT (ROAD).
The bill has a slew of incentives and reforms aimed at cutting red tape to expedite bringing new housing to market. Scott says it has bipartisan support, including from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts.
“When she and I can come together and work on reducing the price of housing across America, it’s because it’s not a Democrat issue, it’s not a Republican issue, it’s not a Black issue it’s not a white issue. It’s an American dream issue,” Scott said. “And people who put their own politics to the side and focus on the people, we can get things done together.”
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On Friday, Scott pointed to the project as an example of how private investment with a focus on affordability can address the need for more workforce housing, without heavy-handed government involvement. Pointe Grand is privately funded, with no public dollars involved.
Scott brought up his mother, a nurse’s aide who became a homeowner at age 38, when he discussed the importance of living in a quality home close to where one works.
“We forgot the human cost of having to live so far from work,” Scott said.
Scott said he hopes the bill passes this year, when he expects Republicans and Democrats to make affordability a top issue in the campaign for the November midterm elections. “The No. 1 issue this cycle is affordability,” Scott said.
Over the past two years, the city of Beaufort has taken steps to streamline its approval process, including eliminating the Design Review Board and Metropolitan Planning Commission and creating a single Planning Commission. To reduce the number of meetings, a conceptual meeting followed by one more final meeting was added to the code.
Rapid growth raises concerns
Apartment construction has boomed in Beaufort since 2020, with 2,410 units approved and 1,258 constructed, according to the city’s Community Development Department.
The growth has prompted residents at times to raises concerns about the loss of trees and increased traffic.
As recently as November, the issue was raised at a public meeting.
Kimberly McGuire, who lives on Bostick Circle, testified at a Nov. 18 City Council meeting about her concern that trees are being clearcut to make way for apartment complexes, reducing the city’s natural beauty and wildlife habitat, particularly in the Old Salem Road area.
That area, she said, has changed drastically with the construction of three enormous apartment complexes. Pointe Grand is located just to the north of Old Salem Road.
“If this further development is inevitable, I strongly urge the city council to please protect the natural environment and lessen the negative impacts on current residents who have lived there 20-plus years,” McGuire said.
McGuire said her commute to work has increased from 20 to 35 minutes. Even running errands has become stressful because of increased traffic, she said.
“You can’t make a left turn,” McGuire said. “It just takes a lot of waiting and patience to avoid a collision.”
