NORFOLK, Va. - A new affordable apartment complex is now opening in the City of Norfolk, offering 164 units.
City leaders and the developers held a ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday morning.
The Market Heights Apartments are located at the corner of Brambleton Avenue and Tidewater Drive.
The units are already leased out and they got four-times as many applications as they could accommodate.
"More of these are absolutely needed and necessary," said Carl Hardee, the president & CEO of Lawson Companies, the real estate developer behind the new apartments.
There are income requirements to live in the units. The rents are drastically lower than other nearby luxury apartments.
A two-bedroom apartment goes for $1003 a month here, compared with rents that are more than $2,000 downtown.
"The housing need is real right now. We are millions of units short in the country and in the state - same thing - tremendous shortage of housing," said Hardee.
News 3 has been extensively reporting on the issue of affordable housing.
A state reported released in 2021 found Virginia has a shortage of 200,000 affordable housing units for low-income or extremely low-income residents.
"If our communities want to thrive, we've got to all come together and find affordable housing solutions," said Susan Dewey, the CEO of Virginia Housing, a non-profit that helps people get affordable housing.
"It's going to take a lot more focus on the local level of land use and how we can find more buildable lots. There's infrastructure and needs that go along with that, so it's not an easy fix," said Dewey.
It's a fix housing officials say is needed as construction on other apartment units continues in Norfolk.
"[The emcee] just came out to me and said, 'In Virginia Beach, they tolerate jet noise. In Norfolk, we love construction noise," said Mayor Kenny Alexander.
