Harwich Ecumenical Council for the Homeless,
Inc.
In addition to expanding our borrower pool, we have
significantly expanded the geographic area of our lending. The Harwich
Ecumenical Council for the Homeless, Inc. (HECH) on Cape Cod, has been
providing affordable rental housing for low-income families for nearly
a decade. With the boom in real estate values on Cape Cod, affordable
rental housing, even off-season, has disappeared. The Loan Fund in a
unique partnership with Cape Cod Five Cents Savings Bank (Cape Cod 5)
made a $1.1 million loan on eight residential mortgages.
Our purchase of the loans fixed their interest rates
and also reduced Cape Cod 5's exposure to HECH, enabling it to more
readily consider new financing requests from HECH. In addition, due
to the re-financing, HECH was able to generate $400,000 in equity to
build its organizational capacity and to expand its home purchase program.
We are currently working on replicating this project with other non-profit
housing groups and local banks on the Cape.
We believe that this is the first time in the country
that this type of transaction has worked and it represents one more
area in which Boston Community Capital has been ahead of the curve in
preserving affordable housing and helping to build healthy communities.
