Central District House: Seattle’s first ground-up Social Housing project will rise at 24th and Yesler

The Bird’s modernist angles will make way for 20 new affordable homes (Image: Seattle Dream Homes)

The first new affordable building the Seattle Social Housing Developer builds from the ground up will come in the Central District.

The Seattle Social Housing Developer has announced Central District House, its first construction project, will take place at 2402 E Yesler Way, marking a major milestone for the public development authority.

Plans call for a roughly $15 million, 20-home mixed-income development designed to Passive House environmental standards, with over half configured as two- and three-bedroom family units. Tenant selection will prioritize Central District residents and “people with current and historical roots” through the city’s Community Preference guidelines to help counter displacement.

Atelierjones is attached as the architect for the project.

The 20 new homes will be affordable rental units, permanently owned and operated by the public development authority.

SSHD has been making steady progress since its approval by the city’s voters in 2023.

CHS reported last winter on stronger than expected funding for the new authority giving the developer a head start in its mission to create and acquire affordable housing.

Officials said the voter-approved 5% tax on employers that pay any employee more than $1 million in compensation climbed above $115 million. The city began collecting the first Prop 1A payments from employers for the 2025 tax year in January. The tax had been expected to raise more than $50 million annually. A reported “10,000 applicants” signed up for the lottery for the developer’s first acquired property on Western Ave.

The income mix in Seattle Social Housing Developer properties is hoped to differ from previous affordable housing in Seattle by using mixed-income tier structure that spans from deeply low-income households up to middle-income earners, rather than serving low-income tenants exclusively.

The Central District and Capitol Hill have absorbed a large portion of the city’s most recent waves of redevelopment. In addition to market rate projects, major affordable redevelopment has reshaped many blocks.

The opening of Community Roots Housing’s Liberty Bank Building at 24th and Union in 2019 created 115 100%-affordable apartment units and street level commercial and restaurant space.

The Africatown Plaza mixed-use building at 23rd and Spring opened in 2025 as a 100% affordable, publicly funded project from Africatown Community Land Trust and Community Roots.

Meanwhile, developer Jaebadiah Gardner has held up his efforts with former church properties along 23rd Ave as examples a for-profit response can be part of balancing the city’s need for new housing with equitable growth in the Central District.

Other for-profit developments are also reshaping the area including the seven-story Acer House, the new “Afrofuturist”-styled development at the corner of 23rd and Cherry.

SSHD’s mission to serve the city will begin a few blocks east but its plans stretch beyond the CD.

Interim Chief Executive Officer Tiffani McCoy said the authority expects to announce a second acquisition before the end of year. By the end of 2027, SSHD plans to own more than 1,000 homes. “The ambitious pipeline is dependent on a successful low-interest bond issuance,” the authority said in its announcement.

The Central District corner has civic roots. it holds two cabin-like structures built by the late Washington State House Speaker Frank Chopp and his father, including “The Portal” and “The Bird,” a timber-framed home where Chopp’s daughter and community members lived. As the story goes, Chopp and his father bought the land at a public auction to build the structures as “sort of a de facto Eagle Scout project.” The structures weren’t completed until the early 1980s.

Following Chopp’s passing in 2025, his widow, Nancy Long, offered the site to SSHD to advance his legacy as an affordable housing champion.

The property, just around the corner from the Douglass-Truth Library, is valued at $940,000, according to the county.

The modernist — but poorly aged — structures will be demolished to make way for the new building.

SSHD staff confirmed feasibility studies showed the 0.18-acre parcel is “very suitable for a Seattle social housing development with minimal risks to construction.”

During Thursday’s board vote, member Carl Nelson praised the deeper impact on residents: “A budget is an ethical decision, and the power to change that with your neighbors… I just want to commend the staff for what I think are really exciting first steps.”

Groundbreaking is scheduled for fall 2027, with completion targeted by late 2028.

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