Not for Rent, Not for Sale

Nearing completion at Camden, NJ. this week is a Government housing project (for defense shipyard workers) the like of which the U.S. has never seen before. Ground for Camden's 500-family Audubon Village was broken only last February. The buildings were made by a partial prefabrication technique which enabled a crew of ten men to knock together walls and roof in three hours. But it is not only speed which makes Audubon Village unique. It is also the financial plan.

Houses at Audubon Village are neither for sale nor for rent (nor free). Instead they will be occupied and eventually paid for under a system devised by ingenious Colonel Lawrence Westbrook, special assistant in Federal Works Agency. ARCHITECTURAL FORUM, hailing the plan as the most promising housing idea in years, describes the workings in detail in its June issue:

Audubon Village residents will make monthly payments covering maintenance, insurance, local taxes, reserves--plus interest on the money put up for the project and amortization. In the process they will build up an equity, not in their individual homes, but in the entire project. In about 25 years the Government expects to have its $1,500,000 investment back and the residents will own the entire village.

No down payment will be required. It is estimated that monthly payments will range from $24 for three rooms to $36 for five. Residents can move from one house to another as their space needs change. If they move away, they will not have to find a buyer to get back the equity they have built up. Indeed, they can use the equity for borrowing or application against rental payments in periods of emergency.

Theory behind the Camden Plan is that the 48% of all U.S. non-farm families which pay $20-$40 a month housing costs can ill afford to risk home-ownership because 1) they have trouble saving enough money for the conventional down payment; 2) they want or have to move two to seven times in the period ordinarily required to pay off a house. But when renting they have to pay somebody else for the privilege of flexibility and protection from loss, thus do not get as good housing as they should.

Colonel Westbrook believes that his plan combines the advantages of both ownership and rental. Moreover, it will give residents substantial savings in maintenance costs (through centralized staff and purchases), will protect them against neighborhood deterioration by insuring that no building will fall into disrepair or be replaced by a hot-dog stand. Still more hopeful is the fact that the Camden Plan is not subsidy housing. Although a small subsidy was provided at Audubon Village to make up for construction delays caused by bad weather and a strike, the plan's basic principle is for projects to pay for themselves. Thus, as applied to, it offers a way out from the discouraging trend of many previous defense housing projects, built under subsidy arrangements, which set rents in proportion to renters' incomes. Colonel Westbrook's office has planned or started Camden Plan projects at Linden (N.J.), Dayton, Detroit, South Bend, Philadelphia, Dallas.*

But the plan need not be confined to emergency housing or Government financing. ARCHITECTURAL FORUM speculates on the possibility that the example of Audubon Village may stimulate private capital to undertake similar projects. In that event, private capital would have a new investment outlet, the building industry would gain a stable market and the U.S. would get badly needed housing.

* When Colonel Westbrook visited Dallas last fortnight, a crew of 50 workmen raced against another team to complete a house. Inside of 58 minutes, a family, furniture and groceries were moved in and the family's pretty daughter was in the bathtub (for publicity purposes--see cut).

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.