Contact: Jason Dietz, Summit County Housing Director, 970-409-8458

SUMMIT COUNTY – Summit County is expanding the Housing Helps program to unincorporated areas of the Snake River, Lower Blue and Tenmile basins. After a successful launch in the Upper Blue Basin in collaboration with the Town of Breckenridge, the County aims to use the program to help create, maintain and preserve homes for local workers in other areas of the county.

"We’ve seen strong interest in this program in the greater Breckenridge area, so we’re convinced it’s a valuable tool in our workforce-housing toolbox," Summit County Housing Director Jason Dietz said. "It complements our efforts to develop new workforce housing, and we’re excited about expanding the program’s geographic scope to other areas of Summit County that have historically served as workforce-housing neighborhoods."

Through Housing Helps, Summit County offers homeowners and homebuyers a financial incentive to place deed restrictions on existing homes, dedicating the properties to members of the local workforce. Summit County will pay an owner or a buyer to record a deed restriction on an unrestricted market-rate home. The payment is typically about 10-15 percent of the property’s current value.

During the past year, Summit County has worked in partnership with the Town of Breckenridge to place workforce-housing deed restrictions on several homes in unincorporated areas of the Upper Blue Basin. The Town and the County split the cost of Housing Helps deed restrictions on homes outside town limits whose owners or buyers have applied to the Town’s program.

Program eligibility and payment amount for a deed restriction vary depending on the market, the home’s location and its suitability as workforce housing. Recipients may use the funds for a down payment, home repairs, special assessments or any other purpose. In return, recipients are required to execute a permanent deed restriction that requires the home to be occupied by a local worker. The deed restriction allows the local worker be the owner or a renter of the unit; it does not impose caps on appreciation, occupant income or rental rates.

For more information on Housing Helps eligibility requirements and the application process, email the Summit County Housing Department or visit www.summithousing.us/real-estate/housing-helps.

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