The real estate industry is at a pivotal moment. Housing affordability is a nationwide challenge, public institutions face mounting pressures to modernize infrastructure, and communities increasingly demand sustainable, connected environments that enhance their quality of life. This series explores the different ways Gilbane Development transforms challenges into opportunities, creating and nurturing vibrant communities that support both current and future generations.
Our Three-Part Approach to Innovation in Affordable Housing
The U.S. housing crisis is deeper and more urgent than ever before. The nation’s 10.9 million extremely low-income renter households face a shortage of 7.1 million affordable and available rental homes, resulting in only 35 affordable and available homes for every 100 extremely low-income renter households.1
At Gilbane Development, we believe solving this crisis requires a bold, repeatable recipe for innovation — one grounded in partnership, creativity, and purpose.
1. Creative Use of Funding to Reach Deeper Affordability
Innovative financing strategies are essential for getting affordable housing done in today’s environment. This means maximizing private sources of capital and marrying them with a mix of local, state, and federal funding. In the right market environment, projects incorporating a tranche of market-rate units reduce reliance on precious subsidy sources, resulting in larger, inclusive mixed-income projects that both create deeply affordable housing and address market supply issues.
Our commitment to innovation is evident in transformative projects like Atworth in College Park, MD, where we successfully delivered affordable, transit-oriented housing. Through strategic partnerships, we secured low-interest construction financing from Amazon’s Housing Equity Fund and collaborated with the Department of Housing & Community Development (DHCD) to obtain both Housing Investment Trust Funds and, critically, a 98-year abatement on county taxes (PILOT) and significant reductions on utility connection and impact fees—cutting both operating and capital costs.
This groundbreaking financing model, developed in collaboration with Amazon and DHCD, enabled the efficient delivery of affordable housing beyond the traditional LIHTC framework. The result is long-term operational stability and a sustainable debt repayment structure under the 98-year PILOT. By prioritizing creative solutions and partnerships, our team successfully developed an award-winning community that offers direct access to mass transit—including Metro, MARC, and Purple Line stations. The 450+ households in this top-tier mixed-use development also benefit from newly created public open spaces, further enhancing livability and accessibility.
We are also pursuing projects in several contexts where federal Section 8 project-based vouchers can be uniquely leveraged to generate more capital sources for ground-up affordable development. In the right market contexts, voucher rent standards can be significantly higher than the typical voucher rent payment standard, with higher rents increasing net operating income to justify underwriting more permanent debt. While increased reliance on federal resources could be seen as an increased risk, Section 8 has been a consistent and reliable source for decades, and this strategy – in the right market – can significantly decrease the reliance on limited subsidy resources.
2. Innovations in Design and Construction to Drive Down Costs and Improve Resident Experience
We implement innovative technologies to reduce construction timelines, control costs, and improve long-term sustainability. Our award-winning affordable senior housing community, Linden Grove, in Brooklyn, NY, is the tallest affordable modular Passive House, LEED, National Green Building Standard building in the country. In a joint venture partnership with Blue Sea Development Company, we’ve implemented modular construction offering fast delivery of 206 modules manufactured in a controlled environment to reduce costs, speed up project timelines, and allow for adaptive growth.
Barnaby & 7th (formerly known as Belmont Crossing) is an affordable & mixed-income community in Washington, D.C. As part of a multi-phased redevelopment, 275 LIHTC apartment units originally constructed in 1952 and last renovated in 2002 will be reimagined into 518 thoughtfully designed units (in 6 new buildings). By creatively repurposing these structures, Gilbane is preserving Belmont Crossing history and addressing the demand for modern, affordable housing. By using advanced technologies and construction techniques, these new units will be exceptionally energy-efficient – emphasizing sustainability and cost reduction and setting the foundation for a brighter, more inclusive future. All six new buildings are designed to achieve Energy Star and Zero Energy Ready Home (ZERH) certification and obtain either Enterprise Green Community (EGC) Certification or EGC Plus Certification, programmed to meet and exceed current DC Green Code requirements. We are also helping to reduce our carbon footprint by eliminating the need of natural gas in 83% of our new buildings.
3. Preservation has to be part of the answer
While the US produces 50,000 to 78,000 units each year2, that is a drop in the bucket compared to the millions of existing affordable housing units. As a result, any comprehensive affordability strategy must also emphasize preservation and reinvestment in existing affordable housing.
With that in mind, we have pursued a variety of creative strategies to preserve affordability.
With Manhattanville in New York City, we are investing nearly $450mm to renovate 1,272 apartments across six residential buildings, improving living conditions for more than 2,600 residents as part of the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) Permanent Affordability Commitment Together (PACT) program. This resident-centered initiative ensures that the voices of the community shape every aspect of the renovation process, creating a sense of ownership and pride. Our plan delivers safer, modernized homes, revitalized common areas, and landscaped grounds that foster connection and recreation. Beyond the physical upgrades, in collaboration with Goddard Riverside, we ensure vital social services like family support, housing stability, and job training are available to empower residents and unlock new opportunities.
The Barnaby & 7th project, mentioned above, preserves housing for existing residents through a robust “right-to-return” program, which offers returning residents priority unit selection, relocation services, including moving services, a dedicated resident liaison, and events geared to welcome returning residents to their new homes. The project promises to transform this neighborhood positively in Ward 8 in DC by showcasing the power of thoughtful development in fostering community unity. This initiative not only aims to retain long-time residents but also safeguard their neighborhood, exemplifying the benefits of a strong public-private partnership.
Delta Pearl, another affordable & mixed-income community in Washington, D.C., further illustrates the brilliance of preserving and repurposing an existing building while avoiding the environmental impact of tearing down and rebuilding. The substantial renovation and transformation of a forty-year-old, 10-story, 150-unit apartment building on a one-acre parcel into a modern haven for community and affordability resulted in 166 units of market rate and workforce housing, with half reserved for individuals earning no more than 80% of the area’s median income. This innovative approach perfectly balances sustainability, cost-efficiency, and social impact, making Delta Pearl a beacon of thoughtful redevelopment.
1 National Low Income Housing Coalition. (March 2025). The Gap: A shortage of affordable homes. National Low Income Housing Coalition. https://nlihc.org/gap
2 National Housing Finance. (2024). Affordable Housing Completions to Surpass 78,000 Units in 2025. Retrieved from https://www.housingfinance.com/news/affordable-housing-completions-to-surpass-78-000-units-in-2025_o
