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In the Community
Read about Lighthouse's staff service days and other activities we are involved with in the community ... read more
Local News
- Lighthouse Communities and Urban Pizza
Uptown Incubator, Urban Pizza to open April 1. - Madison Square Business Incubator
Madison Square business incubator has community backing for $1.7m project. - Flips Foreclosed Homes
Lighthouse Communities has several homes throughout Kent County that they are revitalizing. The positive investment and development of these properties will likely stabilize property values of the entire block, bringing vitality and prosperity to our communities. - Bringing in NSP funds to address foreclosures and blight in southeast Grand Rapids
Garfield Park and Madison Square neighborhood will benefit from an $820,000 investment in NSP funds allocated by the State of Michigan. Watch the video online. - Countrywide Settlement Funds allocated to housing agencies
Lighthouse Communities and other local housing agencies will receive funds to continue to stabilize the neighborhoods hardest hit by foreclosures in Grand Rapids. - Fighting foreclosures with Neighborhood Stabilization Program funds
Read about the effects of foreclosure in our communities and how Lighthouse will help tackle this issue through the NSP program by making improvements to foreclosed properties and returning them to homeownership. - Madison Square business district
Madison Square business district another step closer to becoming Grand Rapids' second CID
Thank you all for your faith and partnership... We could not do it without you.
- David Allen
Neighborhood Stabilization Program
Lighthouse will take part in HUD’s Neighborhood Stabilization Program (or NSP), as it is now commonly known in the community development field. The maps of the NSP targeted areas in Kent County are now available on our website.
Through the NSP, Lighthouse will help combat the drastic effects of foreclosed, blighted, and abandoned properties. Although Lighthouse has mainly focused its efforts within Grand Rapids and specifically Southtown, the NSP is a countywide effort and Lighthouse’s focus area has now widened to aid in the revitalization of areas of Grandville, Wyoming, Gaines Twp, Lowell and Kentwood. In response to the widespread effects of foreclosure, Lighthouse has the ability and therefore a moral obligation to meet the needs in the area surrounding us. With the hopes of utilizing resources of NSP to offset the negative impacts of foreclosure we will purchase homes county-wide to resell, rent or lease/purchase to community members living at or below 120% area median income (AMI). [For instance, $74,520 equals 120% (AMI) for a family of four].
By being intentional about the selection of properties with a negative impact on surrounding property values we are able to take a home that would not normally resell in its current state, pump resources into it and then sell it at an affordable rate to a low or middle income individual. This effort provides a home to an individual or family that would not otherwise afford it, while also creating a chance to bring revitalization to neighborhoods and communities that would struggle without such investments. The positive investment and development of these properties will likely stabilize property values of the entire block, bringing vitality and prosperity to our communities.
Visit our Housing Services Department page to view the maps of the five NSP targeted areas in Kent County.