![]() ![]() Most of the apartments have two or three bedrooms. just behind the newly opened Arlington Mill Community Center, will be affordable to people or families earning less than 60 percent of the area’s median income, which would mean a family of four with an income of $64,000 or less could qualify. The four-story apartment building, at 901 S. “If I get one of these, I can go to school, too, but now I don’t have time because I work two jobs.” An Alexandria grocery store cashier, Tebeje said she can’t save for school because her rent is so high. ![]() “We need to have an apartment without paying a lot of money,” she said. “We have lived here seven years, and we want to try for lower rents.”Īmong the taxi drivers, computer techs and disabled senior citizens, a pregnant Melkam Tebeje turned up at the rental office with several members of her family. “I pay $1,600 for a one-bedroom” on the west end of Columbia Pike, said Senait Worku, a coffee shop cashier who works two jobs, as does her husband. Those who lined up early last week for the chance at the new apartments attested to the difficulty of finding affordable rentals. In 2000, about 20,000 of the 35,000 rental apartments in Arlington were ranked as market-rate affordable now, only 6,000 of the county’s 43,000 rentals are. The increasing cost of living in the inner suburbs, especially in northern Virginia, has taken a significant toll on the number of apartments considered affordable to families. The new construction on Columbia Pike, next to a new community center, she said, proved highly desirable. Nina Janopaul, president and chief executive of nonprofit developer Arlington Partnership for Affordable Housing, called the outpouring of interest “a case of a dramatic rise in demand for affordable housing in the close-in area.” Hundreds of people were expected to seek a spot in the complex via lottery, but on the first of four days that the waiting list was open, they began lining up before dawn. The volume of applicants surprised even the nonprofit developer of the Arlington Mill Residences. In a display of the demand for affordable housing in Northern Virginia, more than 3,600 people have applied for a chance to rent one of 122 new affordable apartments still under construction along Arlington County’s Columbia Pike. ![]()
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