October 9, 2024
GROWING COMMUNITY MEDIA
AT HOME ON THE GREATER WEST SIDE A GCM GUIDE TO HOMEOWNERSHIP
What housing stock can tell you about the C West Side
The types of housing matter to a community By DELANEY NELSON Special Projects Reporter
hicago is known as the city of neighborhoods; it’s a place where each community has unique history, struggles, qualities, goals, residents and values. One distinct, but perhaps overlooked, part of each neighborhood’s identity is its existing housing stock. Housing stock refers to the total number of dwellings in a specific area, including single-
family homes, condominiums and multifamily units. An area’s housing makeup can be used to strategically address the community’s housing needs. Programs designed to increase homeownership in a neighborhood with a high number of owner-occupied units, for example, will look different from programs for a community with a large percentage of multiunit apartment buildings. “If your neighborhood has a lot of two- tofour-unit buildings, and you have a lot of these small rental properties, there may be small-scale landlords who own and run those properties. That’s a different type of consideration than if the neighborhood has all single-family homes, which are more likely to be fully owneroccupied,” said Geoff Smith, executive director
See HOUSING STOCK on page B3
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